Ultra-Wideband Raman Amplifiers for High Capacity Fibre-Optic Transmission Systems

Raman amplifiers can provide gain over a very broad continuous spectrum to enable future ultra-wideband (UWB) transmission systems. We review different design choices of UWB (S+C+L-band) optical amplification technologies based on discrete and hybrid distributed-discrete Raman amplifiers and evaluate their performance in terms of overall noise figure, gain and effective bandwidth. We also review the design of an UWB optical source for amplifier characterisation and impacts of Raman pump linewidth on high capacity transmission performance.