Bit-error-rate performance dependence on pump and signal power of the wavelength converter based on FWM in semiconductor optical amplifiers

We demonstrate the effect of input pump and signal power on the converted optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR), intersymbol interference (ISI) and bit-error-rate (BER) performance of the wavelength converter based on four-wave mixing (FWM) in semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOA). The results of BER measurement show that there exists a trade-off between maximizing signal-to-background ratio (SBR) and minimizing ISI at higher signal powers. A minimum power penalty of less than 1 dB is achieved by optimizing the input pump and signal power.