A comparison between Fabry-Perot and travelling wave laser amplifiers in an 8 Gbps repeatered optical system using a time domain model

A time domain model is used to investigate the use of semiconductor laser amplifiers in repeatered communication systems. This is based on the transmission line laser model and allows modelling over a wide optical bandwidth. Simulations show that the travelling wave laser amplifier provides a high gain and large dynamic and optical bandwidths, whereas the Fabry-Perot device has a smaller gain and optical bandwidth. The filtering action of the Fabry-Perot device is shown to distort the signal in both the time and frequency domains.