Understanding Fiber Optic Communications

What is a fiber optic network and how do they work?
How can hundreds of different signals travel thousands of miles on a single glass thread?
Can a little piece of glass pull one of hundreds of signals off of a fiber?
How can you tell if your fiber is good enough?
What equipment do you need to service and maintain your fiber optic network?
Optical fibers are nothing like electrical amplifiers – so how do they work?


This course provides the foundation essential to developing, debugging, characterizing, and manufacturing cutting edge optic fiber components and networks. Based on the science that enables the technology, the course provides an accurate intuitive grasp of fiber optics. The passive network components, like filters, multiplexers/demultiplexers, couplers, isolators, etc, are all based on the concepts of coherence and interference described with examples like the behavior of waves in a pond. For active devices like transmitters, modulators, receivers, and amplifiers, atomic transitions – spontaneous emission, stimulated emission, Raman scattering and absorption – are presented in a conceptual way that is simple but accurate. The problems caused by chromatic and Polarization Mode Dispersion (PMD) are described by showing light shining through a prism, on the one hand, and through sunglasses, on the other. In every example, components are put in the context of a wide area Dense Wavelength Division Multiplex (DWDM) network.

This Course Will Enable Participants to:
  • Draw a diagram of a DWDM WAN
  • Describe how information is carried tremendous distances by fiber optic networks
  • Understand how every component of a fiber optic network functions
  • Predict potential problems with different network designs and implementations
  • Recommend solutions for obvious problems and know where to look for help with more subtle problems
  • Choose the right equipment to test and service optic fibers, network elements and the networks themselves
  • Safely handle optic fiber, lasers and amplifiers
  • Characterize the current and the next generation of fiber optic systems

This and and all other courses are available for On Site Training

WHAT THE COURSE COVERS:
    Part 1 - Overview
  • The science in four easy pieces
  • High speed, long distance networking
  • How information is carried by optic fibers
  • The 40,000 foot view of a Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) system


    • Part 2 – Optic fibers
  • Fiber structure
  • How fibers carry information
  • The index of refraction and Total internal refraction
  • Modal dispersion and multimode fibers
  • Couplers and splitters


    • Part 3 – Light
  • Properties of electromagnetic waves
  • Recipe for generating light
  • Introduction to polarization and coherence


    • Part 4 – Passive components and test
  • Interference
  • Measuring wavelength
  • Filters: the Fabry-Perot Etalon, thin films, FBGs, bandpass and chirped filters, interferometric filters, AWGs
  • Polarization and the isolator
  • Add/drop nodes and circulators
  • Optical spectrum analyzers
  • Characterization: insertion loss, return loss, polarization dependent loss


    • Part 5 – Signal transmission, modulation and reception
  • Modulation: encoding data into light pulses
  • Direct and indirect modulation techniques – Mach-Zehnder, electro-absorption
  • Generation of light
  • Spontaneous emission and LEDs
  • Stimulated emission and lasers
  • Lasers: DFB, VCSEL, tunable
  • Light detectors – PIN diodes
  • Noise, sensitivity, and modulation bandwidth
  • Active component characterization: linewidth, chirp/FM, power, relative intensity noise, sensitivity, modulation bandwidth, source and receiver responsivity.


    • Part 6 – Optical amplifiers and DWDM
  • Signal loss in fibers
  • Raman scattering and the Erbium Doped Fiber Amplifier (EDFA)
  • Semiconductor and Raman optical amplifiers
  • DWDM signals and design
  • Characterization of DWDM networks: channel gain, noise figure, tilt, flatness, spacing Issues that constrain DWDM networks


    • Part 7 – Dispersion
  • Wavelength and polarization dependence of the index of refraction
  • Chromatic dispersion, its characterization and compensation
  • Polarization Mode Dispersion (PMD)
  • Maximum fiber lengths tolerable to PMD


    • Part 8 – Analysis of fiber optic networks
  • Optical Time Domain Reflectometry (OTDR)
  • Pulse parameters, Bit Error Ratio, eye diagram analysis, power and extinction ratio
  • Jitter in Optical networks – SONET/SDH

WHO SHOULD ATTEND?
  • Engineers, scientists, technicians, engineering and physics students
"We Exceed Your Expectations!"

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