An optical power equalizer based on one Er-doped fiber amplifier

A device which exhibits zero or slightly negative differential optical gain over a broad input power range is demonstrated. The scheme is based upon saturation enhancement by bidirectional signal input in an Er-doped fiber amplifier. Power equalization of better than 1.2 dB over a 14-dB dynamic input power range is achieved at the 1530-nm signal wavelength. The noise figure penalty due to the equalization is below 3 dB as evaluated by a device simulation.>