1.55-$\mu$ m VCSEL Modulation Performance With Dispersion-Compensating Fibers

Vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) at 1.55 mum provide high modulation bandwidth and low attenuation at a low cost. Like other directly modulated lasers, laser chirp limits the link length in standard single-mode fibers at high data rates and fiber dispersion causes bit-error-rate (BER) penalty. This can be overcome by dispersion-compensating fibers (DCFs). This letter investigates the modulation performance of monolithically grown 1.55-mum VCSELs utilizing a DCF to boost the possible link length. Data-transmission experiments are performed at 10 Gb/s and dispersion-dependent BER performance is presented for the first time for this type of laser.