All-optical logic NOR gate using two-cascaded semiconductor optical amplifiers

The authors present a novel all-optical logic NOR gate using two-cascaded semiconductor optical. amplifiers (SOAs) in a counterpropagating feedback configuration. This configuration accentuates the gain nonlinearity due to the mutual gain modulation of the two SOAs. The all-optical NOR gate feasibility has been demonstrated delivering an extinction ratio higher than 12 dB over a wide range of wavelength.