All optical wavelength conversion schemes for increased input power dynamic range

Schemes for increasing the input power dynamic range of interferometric wavelength converters are presented with experiments at 10 Gb/s showing large improvements. A simple conversion scheme that uses current control of the interferometer improves the dynamic range from /spl sim/3-/spl sim/8 dB. A simpler method of inserting an Er-doped fiber amplifier (EDFA) before the converter results in more than 40 dB of dynamic range while a method of using a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) for power control gives /spl sim/28-dB dynamic range.