Towards high-order modulation using complex modulation of semiconductor lasers

Optical communication using high-speed on-off-keying signal by directly modulated semiconductor lasers (DML) was one of the most significant breakthroughs for telecommunication in 1960s. The wide deployment of 2.5-Gb/s per-channel transoceanic optical fiber links in 1990s drove the internet as a global phenomenon. However, the detrimental frequency chirp of DML prevents its application to the subsequent internet capacity evolution. Today, the state-of-the-art long-haul optical transponder uses external modulators to support high-order complex modulation. In contrast, this paper shows that the "detrimental" chirp effect can be exploited to generate complex modulation with a single DML, which achieves dramatic sensitivity gain of signal-to-noise-ratio compared to the conventional intensity modulation of DML. By using large chirp parameters, complex-modulated DML paves an attractive pathway towards high-order pulse-amplitude modulation with an ultra-low transmitter cost, which has great potential in future medium reach optical communications.