100-Gb/s 2R regeneration using cross gain compression in semiconductor optical amplifiers

All-optical 2R regeneration of 100-Gb/s on-off-keying (OOK) signal is experimentally demonstrated based on cross gain compression (XGC) effect in semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs). It is shown that a high-quality logic-inverted signal and SOAs with faster gain recovery times are the two key enabling factors for obtaining regeneration results at such speeds. BER improvement of 1.2~2 dB is experimentally obtained at 1551 nm and regenerative results are demonstrated on a wide wavelength range from 1535 nm to 1555 nm. The tolerance of the input signal to optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) deterioration is also experimentally studied for the 2R regeneration scheme at two different wavelengths.