Up to 182 GBd PAM-4 optical interconnects eliminating receiver-side equalization DSP

The rapid development of artificial intelligent clusters and computing networks demands solutions with minimized power consumption and latency to scale effectively. Traditionally, high-speed intensity modulation with direct detection (IM/DD) optical interconnects rely heavily on digital signal processing (DSP), leading to substantial power consumption and high latency. In this work, we utilize a broadband thin-film lithium niobate (TFLN) Mach-Zehnder modulator (MZM) chip to compare performance differences between linear receive optics (LRO) and fully DSP solutions. We demonstrate the elimination of receiver-side equalization DSP, achieving a generation of 154 GBd PAM4 and 190 GBd OOK signals, both with bit-error rates (BERs) well below the KP4-FEC decision threshold. Additionally, up to 182 GBd PAM4 is transmitted over 150 m of a standard single-mode fiber, and 196 GBd OOK signal is generated while maintaining a BER below the 20% soft-decision forward error correction (SD-FEC) threshold. This approach drastically reduces both power consumption and latency, while high-bandwidth devices retain performance and ensure broad interoperability.