Experimental demonstration of real-time 3Gb/s optical OFDM transceivers

Real-time optical orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OOFDM) transceivers based on off-the-shelf components including FPGAs are experimentally demonstrated, for the first time, incorporating key functionalities such as live transceiver optimisation and advanced channel estimation, and also utilising self-developed IFFT/FFT logic algorithms verified at 10 Gb/s. The fastest ever real-time end-to-end transmission of 3Gb/s DQPSK- and 16-QAM-encoded OOFDM signals over 500 m multi-mode fibers is achieved with BERs of <3.3x10(-9) in intensity-modulation and direct-detection systems employing directly modulated DFB lasers. Excellent performance robustness is also observed to various offset launch conditions. This work is a significant breakthrough in demonstrating the great potential of OOFDM for practical implementation in optical networks.