Performance assessment of dispersion supported transmission at 20 Gbit/s using a semiconductor optical booster amplifier

In this paper, we present a set of laser parameters suitable for simulation of optical transmission systems operated at 20 Gbit/s. Using these laser parameters, we assess the performance of dispersion supported transmission at 20 Gbit/s using an EDFA or a SOA as a booster amplifier. It is shown that the use of a SOA as a booster amplifier improves the system performance for link lengths ranging from 8 to 20 km of SMF due to partial chirp compensation, and degrades the system performance between 1.2 and 2.5 dB for link lengths ranging from 30 to 50 km. At 60 km, the sensitivity degradation is about 3.6 dB. It is also shown that an increase of the unsaturated single pass gain of the SOA from 20 dB to 25 dB causes a sensitivity degradation of 2.8 dB after dispersion supported transmission at 20 Gbit/s over 50 Irm of SMF.