Simultaneous WDM RoF Signal Generation Utilizing an All-Optical Frequency Upconverter Based on FWM in an SOA

A simultaneous all-optical frequency upconversion technique using four-wave mixing in a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) is experimentally demonstrated for wavelength-division-multiplexing (WDM) radio-over-fiber applications. Eight WDM optical radio-frequency (RF) signals having the RF frequency of 26.5 GHz are simultaneously generated by mixing eight WDM optical intermediate-frequency (IF) signals having the IF frequency of 2.5 GHz with an optical local oscillator signal of 24 GHz in a single SOA. The power penalty for simultaneous generation of eight WDM optical RF signals at the bit-error rate of 10(-9) is less than 2.7 dB.