Field-trial demonstration of a one-pump fiber optics parametric amplifier with independent polarization gain

We present a field-trial evaluation of an in-line fiber optical parametric amplifier (FOPA) without polarization dependent gain (PDG). This parametric amplifier uses a polarization diversity technique (PDT) to reduce the PDG to less than 0.05 dB. We analyzed the performance of a system with an in-line FOPA comparing the results of its bit-error-rate (BER) with the BER of a system with an in-line Erbium doped fiber amplifier (EDFA). FOPA presented a power penalty that was 0.7dB higher than the one obtained with the EDFA, showing that the PDG was effectively suppressed with the PDT.