FIBER OPTICS

Prof. R.K. Shevgaonkar

Department of Electrical Engineering

Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay

Lecture: 22

Optical Receivers

Fiber Optics, Prof. R.K. Shevgaonkar, Dept. of Electrical Engineering, IIT Bombay Page 1
 When light from an optical fiber carrying data in the form of optical pulses, is
incident onto a photo-detector material, various types of noise are introduced into the
already noisy signal and the output electrical signal from the photo-detector has
noise which causes pulse distortion in the conversion from the optical to the
electrical domain. That is, a rectangular optical pulse does not remain exactly
rectangular of the same width as the optical pulse when the optical pulse is
converted to an electrical pulse in the photo-detector. The various types of noise
introduced by the photo-detector are the shot noise, dark-current noise and thermal
noise which have already been discussed.

The shot or quantum noise involves Poissons statistics and is multiplicative in

nature. However, the thermal noise is Gaussian in nature and is, hence, additive
noise. The presence of these noises in the detected output signal of the photo-
detector incurs the requirement of defining certain parameters to evaluate the
performance efficiency of a photo-detector and also for a qualitative comparison of
various photo-detectors, so that the right photo-detector can be used for the right
application. One such quantity is the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the receiver which
is defined as the ratio of the useful signal power in the received signal to the
unwanted noise power in the received signal, at the receiver of the data
communication system. However, SNR is more suited for performance evaluation of
analog communication system. For a digital communication system, the parameter of
interest that is used to evaluate the performance of the system at the receiver is the
bit-error-ratio (BER) of the receiver. In a similar manner as the derivation of
expression for SNR, we shall derive an expression for the BER for an optical
receiver in the subsequent discussions.

Data transmission systems may be broadly classified into three types- analog,
digital and mixed-signal data transmission systems. Optical communication supports
both analog and digital data transmission schemes. Due to this versatility and the
wideband nature, optical communication is the most preferred mode of data
communication in the modern day.

In this section, we shall emphasize on digital data transmission in the optical

domain via optical communication link and investigate the performance of the optical
receiver with respect to digital data i.e. data in the form of bits (binary digits 0 and 1).
In digital amplitude modulation scheme (amplitude shift keying scheme) in the optical
domain, the presence of light indicates a binary 1 (or 0) and the absence of light
indicates a binary 0 (or 1) in accordance to the positive (or negative) digital logic. Let
us assume that the optical source is unbiased i.e. there is equal probability of
transmission of 0 and 1. Let us also assume that the overall noise of the system be
Gaussian noise which is additive in nature. To make the analysis of BER simpler, we
may also assume that the values of the variance of the photo-detector output for the
optical intensities in the 0 and 1 level are different, but the individual noise in the two
levels be Gaussian in nature. This assumption accounts well for the Poisson shot-
noise generated in the photo-detector in the two levels (0 and 1).

Fiber Optics, Prof. R.K. Shevgaonkar, Dept. of Electrical Engineering, IIT Bombay Page 2
 Under the above assumptions, the two voltage levels that represent binary 0
and 1 are depicted in the figure 22.1 below:

Figure 22.1: 0 and 1 levels of digital data in a photo-detector output.

As seen from the above figure, the introduction of noise into the detected
signal causes the photo-current to fluctuate about its mean level in the two logic
levels which indicate the two binary digits 0 and 1. According to our assumption, the
variances of these fluctuations are not equal in the two levels. This fact is obvious
from the probability density function shown in the above figure which shows different
variance shapes about the mean level for the two logic levels. Obviously, the
variance for the logic 0 level is narrower than that for the logic 1 level because the
logic 1 level involves shot noise which is appropriately given by a Poisson
distribution but the logic 0 level involves only dark-current noise and thermal noise
which are Gaussian in nature. The probability density curves shown in the above
figure indeed show the extent of the detector current fluctuations about the mean
values for the two logic levels 0 and 1. Since we have assumed Gaussian variation
of noise for the two levels, we may write probability density function for the current
for the two logic levels 0 and 1 as:

( )
(| ) (22.1)

( )
(| ) (22.2)

Fiber Optics, Prof. R.K. Shevgaonkar, Dept. of Electrical Engineering, IIT Bombay Page 3
 In the above equations, 0 and 1 are the standard deviations of the current
in the two logic levels 0 and 1 respectively from their respective mean current
levels I0 and I1. We may assume I0 to be zero, but due to various reasons some
amount of photo-current also flows during the logic 0 level and so we assume a
general mean current level I0 for the logic 0 level.

Since the data is in binary format, there is a threshold current (or voltage)
level which differentiates the two logic levels from each other. That is, if the detected
current (or voltage) is greater than the threshold level, the detected bit is assigned as
1 and if the detected current (or voltage) is lower than the threshold level, the
detected bit is assigned as 0. Let us assume the photo-current (or voltage)
corresponding to the threshold level be denoted by Ith (or Vth). However, if a 0 was
transmitted by the source but, due to noise and other factors, if the detected signal
level exceeds the threshold level the detected bit would be assigned as 1. Similarly,
if a 1 was transmitted by the source and the detected signal level drops below
threshold level, the detected bit is assigned 0. If any or both of these two cases
happen then bit errors are said to have occurred in the data transmission. The
quantity that analyses the performance of the communication link with respect to bit
errors is the bit-error-ratio (BER) as mentioned earlier. BER is indeed a probability of
occurrence of bit errors in the transmission. The following expression can, hence, be
written for BER:

( | ) ( ) ( | ) ( ) (22.3)

We have assumed the source to be unbiased which means there is an equal

probability of occurrence of 1 as that of 0 in the stream of data bits. Therefore:

( ) ( ) (22.4)

The equation 22.3 can be re-written as:

{ ( | ) ( | )} (22.5)

The first probability term in the R.H.S. of equation 22.5 is given by the shaded
area under the probability density curve above the threshold level in the figure 22.1
indicated by P0(V). That is,

( )
( | ) (22.6)

Similarly, the second probability term in equation 22.5 is the area of the
shaded region indicated by P1(V) in figure 22.1. Therefore:

( )
( | ) (22.7)

Fiber Optics, Prof. R.K. Shevgaonkar, Dept. of Electrical Engineering, IIT Bombay Page 4
 The integrals in the equations 22.6 and 22.7 cannot be solved in the closed
form and are hence represented by certain functions called the error functions
because they are used for calculations of bit errors. Since the error functions are
used for calculation of errors of two complementary bits, they are more appropriately
called the complementary error functions. These complementary error functions are
defined as:

( ) (22.8)

Using the above definition of complementary error function, the probabilities

given in equations 22.6 and 22.7 can be written as:

( | ) ( ) (22.9)

( | ) ( ) (22.10)

The value of the above probabilities can be evaluated from the standard
complementary error function tables that are available. So, with the knowledge of the
threshold current value, the value of the above probabilities can be evaluated from
tables and from these values the BER can be calculated using the following
relationship:
{ ( ) ( )} (22.11)

The above equation shows that the value of BER depends upon the threshold
current value which can also be observed from figure 22.1 as follows- if the threshold
current value is shifted lower than that shown, more 0s would be detected as 1s
and majority 1s would be detected correctly; if the threshold level is shifted
upwards, more number of 1s would be detected as 0s but majority 0s would be
detected correctly. Thus the threshold level should be pre-set at an optimum level so
that number of bit errors is minimized. For minimum value of bit-error ratio, the
shaded areas indicating the error probabilities of 0 and 1 (in figure 22.1) must be
equal which requires that the following condition must be satisfied:
(22.12)

(22.13)

The above value of threshold current is the optimum value which ensures a
minimum value of BER. If 0=1 (i.e. in presence of thermal noise only), the
threshold level lies exactly half-way between the two logic levels. However, for
optical communication systems the noises in the two logic levels is assumed to be
unequal and so, the two variances cannot be equal which suggests that equation
22.13 gives the best possible value of threshold current level for minimum BER.

Fiber Optics, Prof. R.K. Shevgaonkar, Dept. of Electrical Engineering, IIT Bombay Page 5
 If we substitute the value of the threshold current level given by equation
22.13 in either the L.H.S. or the R.H.S. of equation 22.12 we obtain a quantity known
as the Q-parameter of the data transmission which is denoted by Q. That is:
(22.14)

In fact, q-parameter of the data transmission is the quantity that decides the
BER of the data transmission. The numerator of the equation 22.14 is, in fact, the
current swing (voltage swing) assigned between the two logic levels 0 and 1. The
variances 0 and 1 are the standard deviations of the photo-current from the pre-
assigned mean current levels of the respective binary bit. The q-parameter of given
by equation 22.14 is also indicative of the noise margin of the data transmission.

If we express the optimized BER in terms of the q-parameter of the data

transmission using equation 22.11, we obtain:
( ) (22.15)

For large values of Q (typically Q>3) the complementary error function may be
approximated by an exponential function and the BER may be expressed as:

(22.16)

The above equation shows that BER is a strong exponential function of Q and
the curve plotted between BER and Q looks like the one shown below:

Figure 22.2: BER Vs Q-parameter curve of photo-detector

It is evident from the above figure that, for a small change in the Q there is a
rapid decrease in the BER because (as seen from the figure) the BER-axis is
logarithmic which means that the decrease would be in powers of 10. If the tolerable
BER of data transmission be at a particular value, the corresponding value of Q can

Fiber Optics, Prof. R.K. Shevgaonkar, Dept. of Electrical Engineering, IIT Bombay Page 6
be geometrically found out from the above curve, and from the knowledge of the
value of Q the threshold level can be appropriately decided. For example, in optical
communication, the acceptable BER (without the application of any error correcting
schemes) is 10-9 and the corresponding value of Q6.

Let us now revert back to our discussion on the SNR of the data transmission
in the optical domain. The operation of the photo-detector may be classified into two
domains- high power domain (in the presence of optical signal flux) and low power
domain (in the absence of optical signal flux). Owing to the different types of noises
present in the two domains, these domains may also be known as- thermal noise
dominated operation (low power domain) and shot-noise dominated operation (high
power domain). If T denotes the total variance of the thermal and dark current
noises and s denotes the total variance due to shot-noise in the photo-detected
signal, then:
For thermal noise dominated operation:

For shot-noise dominated operation:

However, the noise which dominates the operation is also dependent on the
relative distance between the transmitter and the receiver in the optical
communication link. If the two are very near to each other, some optical power exists
even in the low-power domain because this optical power fails to attenuate enough
due to the short distance between the transmitter and receiver. In this case the
operation would be more of shot-noise dominated than thermal noise. On the other
hand, if the transmitter and receiver are very far away, the transmitted optical flux
attenuates to very low power levels and even in the presence of optical signal flux
(due to its low power) the operation may be of the low-power type and the thermal
noise dominates over shot noise.

The expression for SNR of an optical communication link (as given in equation
20.9) can be written as:

(22.17)

The terms in above expression represent the same parameters as in equation

20.9. The above expression is, however, a general expression for the SNR. For a
thermal noise dominated operation: ; the SNR can be
written as:

(22.19)

For a p-i-n photo-detector having responsivity R: M=1 and signal current

ip=Pin.R, where Pin is the incident optical signal power. Also, the expression for iT2
can be substituted from equation 20.8. Substituting the above values in the
expression 22.19 we obtain the expression for the SNR for thermal noise dominated
operation as:
Fiber Optics, Prof. R.K. Shevgaonkar, Dept. of Electrical Engineering, IIT Bombay Page 7
 (22.20)

For a given photo-detector, R and B (bandwidth) are constants and so we

may write:

(22.21)

Thus, for a thermal noise dominated situation, the SNR of the receiver is
proportional to the square of the incident optical power. That is, the SNR improves
very rapidly with increase in incident optical signal power. Also, the SNR is
proportional to the load resistance used in the photo-detector circuit. Therefore a
large value of the load resistance is preferred for a better SNR.

If SNR=1, then we may say that all the power that is incident onto the photo-
detector material is converted to equivalent noise by the photo-detector. Therefore,
we may define a quantity known as the noise equivalent power (NEP) of the photo-
detector which determines the amount of incident signal power that would be
converted to noise by the receiver. Lesser the value of NEP better is the receiver.
NEP is defined (using equation 22.20) as:

( ) (22.22)

For a shot-noise dominated situation: ; the SNR

can hence be written as:

(22.23)

Substituting the values of the quantities in the equation 22.18 for a normal p-i-
n photo-detector (using equation 20.5) we have the following expression for SNR:

(22.24)

Thus, for a given photo-detector with responsivity R operating in high power

domain:

(22.25)

If we concentrate on the two equations 22.21 and 22.25, we find that at low
input optical signal power (when thermal noise dominates the photo-detector output
noise) the SNR improves very rapidly with increase in optical power. However, as
the input optical power increases and the operation shifts to the high power domain
(when shot noise starts to dominate the photo-detector output noise), the
improvement of SNR with input optical power is rather slow due to the linear relation
between the two.

Fiber Optics, Prof. R.K. Shevgaonkar, Dept. of Electrical Engineering, IIT Bombay Page 8