Abstract
The dual stage optical splitter configuration is often utilized in PON systems to effectively accommodate widely-dispersed users. This paper introduces a more effective user accommodation approach that places bidirectional optical amplifiers in some branches of the optical splitter inside the central office (CO); it allows a single optical line terminal (OLT) to achieve the coexistence of normal- and extended-distance areas. To ease the issue of amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) noise, which is inherent in this system configuration, we propose to use a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA)-based burst-mode optical amplifier with a fast automatic level control (ALC) circuit for upstream amplification.
