Review on SOA-MZI-based photonic add/drop and switching operations

Semiconductor optical amplifier-Mach-Zehnder interferometer (SOA-MZI) is a technologically mature optical device that can be exploited for a wide range of operations on both amplitude and phase modulated signals, with performance limited by the carrier lifetime in the SOAs. Recent advances on SOA structures have demonstrated their suitability for high quality, ultra-fast photonic signal processing, making SOA-MZI a good candidate for elaborating signals in new generation high-capacity optical networks. Dynamic wavelength switching/routing and add/drop operations are expected to bring benefits in future optical networks in terms of improved system flexibility and efficiency. The capability of performing such operations directly in the optical domain can significantly reduce the number of opto/electrical and electro/optical conversions in the routing nodes, reducing their power consumption and their latency time. Moreover, since phase-shift keying (PSK) formats or other advanced modulation formats involving both amplitude and phase modulation, start to coexist in optical communication systems with the conventional on-off keying (OOK) modulation format, the availability of a single device, suitable for processing all these different signals, is mandatory. The SOA-MZI fits all these requirements for both OOK and constant-envelope phase-modulated signals, providing a compact and flexible solution. Here we review on the use of the SOA-MZI for carrying out alloptical switching operations, by realizing wavelength conversion and add/drop functionalities, both for OOK and differential binary phase shift keying (DPSK) signals up to 40 Gb/s. Power penalties lower than 2 dB are demonstrated in all cases. © 2013 Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.