Abstract

An effective way of increasing the overall optical fibre capacity is by expanding the bandwidth used to transmit signals. In this paper, the impact of expanding the transmission bandwidth on the optical communication system is experimentally studied using the achievable rates as a performance metric. The tradeoffs between the use of larger bandwidths and higher nonlinear interference (NLI) noise is experimentally and theoretically analyzed. The growth of NLI noise is investigated for spectral bandwidths from 40 GHz up to 7.3 THz using 64-QAM and Nyquist pulse-shaping. Experimental results are shown to be in line with the predictions from the Gaussian-noise model showing a logarithmic growth in NLI noise as the signal bandwidth is extended. A reduction of the information rate of only 10% was found between linear and nonlinear transmission across several transmission bandwidths, increasing up to 7.3 THz. Finally, the power transfer between channels due to stimulated Raman scattering effect is analyzed showing up to 2-dB power tilt at optimum power for the largest transmitted bandwidth of 7.3 THz.