Signal bandwidth enhancement in Parametric amplifiErs by Exploiting multi-moDe nonlinear effects in fibres (SPEED)

发展节能、超高容量的通信网络，使人们和企业在任何地方无缝连接，是现代社会面临的最重要挑战之一。全球通信基础设施的流量持续快速增长，通常以每年40%的速度增长，这是由数量急剧增加的通信服务应用程序（例如Twitter、YouTube、Facebook等）和带宽需求（例如HDTV、3D等）驱动的。多年来光通信系统的巨大进步（例如采用多种波长或新型复杂调制信号）确保了单个光纤中可用带宽/容量的不断增加。当传输这些新类型的信号时，当前的网络需要改变其相应的硬件（例如实现新的发射器和接收器）。然而，理想的网络应该在没有额外硬件成本的情况下处理它们。SPEED项目建议研究与现有光纤技术和功能兼容的全光解决方案，以确保网络能够处理可能在未来几年开发和使用的信号。这将保证消费者可以继续享受新的带宽饥渴的服务，而不需要额外的费用。目前提出的全光解决方案主要基于单模非线性介质的相干混频。SPEED旨在开发一种新的非线性平台技术，即多模式平台技术，为上述面向未来的可升级传动系统提供新颖的低成本和节能解决方案。将进行详细的研究，以证明在许多关键领域的各种破坏性应用中，与广泛开发的单模平台相比，多模非线性平台所提供的优势和增强的功能。由少模波导的空间维度提供的额外自由度将改善系统性能，主要是在宽带操作和噪声方面，该因素与模式数量成正比。

The development of energy-efficient, ultra-high capacity communication networks capable of connecting people and businesses seamlessly everywhere is one of the most important challenges facing modern society. The traffic on the global communications infrastructure keeps rapidly increasing, typically at a rate of 40% per annum, driven by the communication services applications that are drastically increasing in number ( e.g. Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, etc.) and demand on bandwidth (e.g. HDTV, 3D,...). This continuously increase of available bandwidth/ capacity in a single optical fibre has been ensured by the enormous progress in optical communication systems over the years (e. g. employing many wavelengths or new types of complex modulated signals). When transmitting these new types of signals, current networks need to change their corresponding hardware (e. g. implementing new transmitters and receivers). However, the ideal network should handle them at no extra hardware cost.The project SPEED proposes to investigate all-optical solutions that are compatible with the existing fibre technology and functionalities to guarantee that the network can handle signals that may be developed and used in coming years. This will guarantee that the consumer can continue enjoying new bandwidth-hungry services that have being offered at no extra cost.So far, the proposed all-optical solutions are mainly based on coherent mixing in single mode nonlinear media. SPEED aims to develop a new nonlinear platform technology, the multi-mode one, with the vision to propose novel low-cost and energy-efficient solutions for the future-proof upgradable transmission systems discussed above. A detailed study will be conducted to demonstrate the advantages and the enhanced functionality offered by multi-mode nonlinear platform as compared to the widely developed single-mode one in a variety of disruptive applications in many key areas. The added degree of freedom given by the spatial dimension of few-mode waveguides will improve the system performance, mainly in terms of broadband operation and noise by a factor that is proportional to the number of modes.