Performance Analysis of Modulation Formats for Next Generation RoF Systems

Radio over fiber (RoF) has found to be one of the most effective communication techniques. It has the tendency to incorporate both optical fiber and free space radio paths. In this research article, importance, benefits, and applications of RoF system are discussed in detail for futuristic networks. The performance of RoF system is visualized by modulating the data with the RF signal having same frequency at both transmitter and receiver ends. Initially, the performance is checked using non-return to zero (NRZ) format and later compared with duobinary (DB) and carrier suppressed return to zero (CSRZ). Various simulations are performed which directly affect the system performance. Important parameters such as RoF link distance, data rate, transmitter power, amplifier gain, and RF signal frequency are tested. The operation is carried out at 1550 nm wavelength and 30 GHz RF frequency. System is optimized to receive the transmitted waveforms successfully. Simulations are performed in Optisystem 17.0 and MATLAB. For the analysis, the results are plotted using Q-factor and BER values.