Silicon IQ Modulator for Next-Generation Metro Network

Silicon photonics have been extensively demonstrated as the promising solution for low-cost and high-performance transmission network. We show that silicon Mach-Zehnder IQ modulators are capable for next-generation metro network applications. The transmission distances cover whole metro transmission range, up to 960 km. We experimentally demonstrated different modulation formats for different scenarios with these modulators. For 320-km transmission, 56 Gb/s single-sideband discrete multitone transmission was achieved. For 480 km, 80 × 453.2-Gb/s polarization division multiplexing (PDM) orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing hybrid 8-64 quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) dense wavelength division multiplexing signals transmission was achieved. Finally, 80 × 337.9-Gb/s transmission of Nyquist-WDM PDM-16QAM was achieved for 960 km.