WDM coding system with single parity-check channel

We propose a modified WDM coding system with a single parity-check channel to achieve an efficient and flexible WDM coding system. The system provides most of the advantages of the original WDM coding system with just one parity-check channel. The bit rate and the data sequences are unaffected by the coding processes, making it very attractive for practical lightwave systems with standard rates. Compared to serial coding systems, it is able to reduce the number of encoding/decoding pairs in an m-channel WDM transmission system operated at STS-N from m/spl times/N to one. We have evaluated the system performance and analyzed the performance of frame synchronization needed for the modified WDM coding system. An example shows that the WDM coding can reduce the error floor of a four-channel dispersion-limited WDM system from 10/sup -10/ to 10/sup -19/ with reliable frame synchronization.<
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