This new technology will cover the 9,000-kilometer Telstra Endeavour submarine cable between Sydney, Australia, and Oahu, Hawaii, and extract maximum capacity from long-distance submarine and terrestrial cable systems that carry super-channels, whether for new wide-area fibers or existing cables.
In trials of several next-generation coherent modulation super-channel technologies conducted late last year, only two super-channel-based capabilities were successfully demonstrated: Nyquist subcarriers and shared-gain Soft Decision Forward Error Correction (SD-FEC).
The trial validated the benefit of Nyquist subcarriers, which has been shown in other studies to offer approximately a 20 percent increase in transmission range compared to a single-carrier. Furthermore, the trial validated shared-gain SD-FEC, in which carriers with higher throughput can be combined with carriers with lower signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) to improve performance.
Other capabilities demonstrated as part of this study include an ME-PSK (Matrix Enhanced Phase Shift Keying) modulation technique that far surpasses BPSK (Binary Phase Shift Key) performance; and the new high-gain SD-FEC algorithm.
“The comprehensive modulation and compensation techniques in our Advanced Coherent Toolkit enable individual carriers and subcarriers in the superchannel to maximize the overall reach and capacity of the customer’s fiber,” said Scott Jackson, VP of Infinera’s Subsea Business Group. “For example, leveraging these techniques allows cables that previously could only support BPSK to move to higher modulation formats in the future, or to support a mix of formats across carriers and subcarriers, for increased fiber capacity and a better return on investment. This next generation of coherent technology has the potential to dramatically extend the lifespan of existing cable systems while improving the performance of new cables.”.
“With transpacific traffic increasing at 49 percent annually, service providers can leverage these advancements to help their business models keep pace with downward price pressure. Infinera has one of the leading coherent engineering teams, and I applaud them for developing these innovative optical techniques,” said Mr. Jackson.
Andy Lumsden, Director of Network Services at Telstra Global Enterprise and Services, commented: “The flexibility of PIC-based super-channels has proven to be a major advantage in subsea operations, and the addition of next-generation coherent processing provides a significant capacity boost. These capabilities allow us to continue exceeding our customers’ demands and delivering exceptional service levels across Telstra’s global network and in the North American region.”
