Analysis of RF-Pilot-Based Phase Noise Compensation for Coherent Optical OFDM Systems

In coherent optical long-haul transmission systems, orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing represents a promising modulation format. However, due to long symbol length, laser phase noise can be a major impairment. In this manuscript, the RF-pilot-based phase noise compensation scheme is analyzed and compared to conventional common-phase error compensation. It has been shown that the RF-pilot-based phase noise compensation scheme allows for a considerable increase in tolerable laser linewidth as compared to conventional common-phase error compensation at the cost of an increase in system complexity. For a 112-Gb/s transmission scheme, the tolerable linewidth is increased by a factor of ten as compared to common-phase error compensation.