IM/DD Beyond Bandwidth Limitation for Data Center Optical Interconnects

Intensity modulation with direct detection (IM/DD) provides a low-cost solution for data center optical interconnects. To achieve higher data rate, Tomlinson-Harashima precoding (THP) is adopted to increase the operating symbol rate beyond the Nyquist rate defined by the system bandwidth. By applying THP, the signal is precoded by a feedback filter at the transmitter for the mitigation of the intersymbol interference caused by the faster-than-Nyquist signaling and the spectral power fading induced by the interaction of chromatic dispersion and direct detection. In this paper, high-performance THP-based IM/DD transmission is demonstrated, increasing the achievable data rate using a limited system bandwidth. In the experimental demonstration, we achieve a net bit rate of 185 Gb/s for up to 2-km fiber link, transmitting 74 GBd precoded eight-level pulse amplitude modulation (PAM-8) using an IM/DD system with 33 GHz brick-wall electrical bandwidth limitation.