Speaker
Description
The increasing demand for high-capacity, low latency 5G fronthaul networks has intensified interest in Radio-over-Fibre (RoF) architectures. This works presents an end-to-end simulation of a subcarrier-multiplexed (SCM) intermediate-frequency-over-fibre (IFoF) system. Three subcarriers at 1, 3, and 5 GHz are amplitude modulated and upconverted using a 10 GHz intermediate frequency generated using microwave photonics (MWP).
The upconverted composite radio frequency (RF) signal modulates an optical carrier via a Mach-Zehnder modulator (MZM) biased at quadrature and propagates through 10 km of standard single mode fibre (SMF). The simulation accounts for chromatic dispersion, attenuation and laser phase noise in the optical domain.
A novel feature of this architecture is the co-propagation of the local oscillator (LO) reference arm through the same fibre as the modulated carrier. This self-homodyne configuration ensures that frequency drifts and phase perturbations are common-mode between the carrier and the LO. We demonstrate that this results in passive cancellation of laser frequency drift at the coherent receiver, eliminating the need for complex optical phase-locked loops (OPPLs).
Following a 10 m wireless link modeled with Friis free-space path loss and receiver thermal and shot noise, the signal is coherently downconverted and demultiplexed. Performance is quantified through per-subcarrier Q-factors and Bit Error Rates (BER), confirming the proposed self-homodyne IFoF architecture offers a cost-effective and phase-resilient solution for dense 5G mall-cell deployment.
| Apply for student award at which level: | PhD |
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| Consent on use of personal information: Abstract Submission | Yes, I ACCEPT |