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In this letter, we experimentally explore the limited-size aperture effects in an orbital-angular-momentum (OAM)-multiplexed free-space optical (FSO) data link for aerial platforms. 200-Gbit/s data transmission is demonstrated between a ground transmitter and a ground receiver via a flying, retro-reflecting unmanned-aerial-vehicle (UAV) over 100-m round-trip distance by multiplexing two OAM beams. Our results indicate that when the receiver aperture size is limited, both power loss and channel crosstalk would increase. With a receiver aperture diameter of >5 cm, bit error rate (BER) mostly below 3.8 × 10−3 has been achieved for both channels

In this paper, we review high-capacity underwater optical communications using orbital angular momentum (OAM)-based spatial division multiplexing. We discuss methods to generate and detect blue–green optical data-carrying OAM beams as well as various underwater effects, including attenuation, scattering, current, and thermal gradients on OAM beams. Attention is also given to the system performance of high-capacity underwater optical communication links using OAM-based space division multiplexing. The paper closes with a discussion of a digital signal processing (DSP) algorithm to mitigate the inter-mode crosstalk caused by thermal gradients.

We explore the use of orbital-angular-momentum (OAM)-multiplexing to increase the capacity of free-space data transmission to moving platforms, with an added potential benefit of decreasing the probability of data intercept. Specifically, we experimentally demonstrate and characterize the performance of an OAM-multiplexed, free-space optical (FSO) communications link between a ground transmitter and a ground receiver via a moving unmanned-aerial-vehicle (UAV). We achieve a total capacity of 80 Gbit/s up to 100-m-roundtrip link by multiplexing 2 OAM beams, each carrying a 40-Gbit/s quadrature-phase-shift-keying (QPSK) signal. Moreover, we investigate for static, hovering, and moving conditions the effects of channel impairments, including: misalignments, propeller-induced airflows, power loss, intermodal crosstalk, and system bit error rate (BER). We find the following: (a) when the UAV hovers in the air, the power on the desired mode fluctuates by 2.1 dB, while the crosstalk to the other mode is −19 dB below the power on the desired mode; and (b) when the UAV moves in the air, the power fluctuation on the desired mode increases to 4.3 dB and the crosstalk to the other mode increases to −10 dB. Furthermore, the channel crosstalk decreases with an increase in OAM mode spacing.

We explore the use of a switchable single-photon detector (SPD) array scheme to reduce the effect of a detector’s deadtime for a multi-bit/photon quantum link. The case of data encoding using M possible orbital-angular-momentum (OAM) states is specifically studied in this paper. Our method uses N SPDs with a controllable M × N optical switch and we use a Monte Carlo-based method to simulate the quantum detection process. The simulation results show that with the use of the switchable SPD array, the detection system can allow a higher incident photon rate than what might otherwise be limited by detectors’ deadtime. For the case of M = 4 , N = 20 , a 50-ns deadtime for the individual SPDs, an average photon number per pulse of 0.1, and under the limit that at most 10 % of the photon-containing pulses are missed, the switchable SPD array will allow an incident photon rate of 2250 million counts/s (Mcts/s). This is 25 times the 90 Mcts/s incident photon rate that a non-switchable, 4-SPD array will allow. The increase in incident photon rate is more than the 5 times increase, which is the simple increase in the number of SPDs and the number of OAM encoding states (e.g., N ∕ M = 20 ∕ 4 ).

We simulate and experimentally demonstrate the optical single-pixel identification of two-dimensional (2D) objects by analyzing the corresponding complex-valued (i.e, amplitude and phase) Laguerre–Gaussian​ ( LG l , p ) spectra containing both the azimuthal (i.e., l ) and radial (i.e., p ) indices. A sequence of optical beams, each carrying a different superposition of one LG mode and one fundamental Gaussian mode, propagate through the objects. The amplitude and phase contributions of each LG modal component are then obtained by four sequential power measurements using a single-pixel detector. We reconstruct the 2D spatial structures of fan-shaped objects with different orientation angles and an “SC” logo using the measured complex LG spectra that contain 31 different azimuthal and 31 different radial index values. The simulation and experimental results show that (i) the minima positions of the amplitude-only LG sub-spectra (fixed l = 0 , varying p ) are dependent on the object’s spatial information along its radial direction, (ii) the amplitude-only LG spectrum is likely to be insensitive to the object’s orientation angle, and (iii) the slopes of the phase-only LG sub-spectra (fixed p , varying l ) are linearly proportional to the object’s orientation angle.

We demonstrate an optical recirculating delay loop by shifting the spatial mode order of orbital-angular-momentum (OAM) beams in the free-space. The desired delay can be selected at the loop output by exploiting the orthogonality of the OAM modes. When sending a 20-Gbaud quadrature-phase-shift-keyed (QPSK) signal through the delay system, three recirculations are demonstrated, each with an additional delay of 2.2 ns. Around 0.5 and 2 dB system penalties are measured for the second and third recirculations, respectively. We also simulate the performance of our approach under different scenarios.

We experimentally demonstrate the four-fold multiplexing of Hermite–Gaussian (HGmn) or Laguerre–Gaussian (LGlp) modes to achieve a 400 Gbit/s quadrature-phase-shift-keyed (QPSK) free-space optical communication link. In this experiment, both modal indices for the HG and LG modes are simultaneously utilized to achieve a larger potential orthogonal modal space. Moreover, we also investigate and compare the effects of aperture size, lateral displacement, and rotation on the system. We measure the degree of performance degradation due to the following: (1) a receiver aperture with a limited size causes power loss and crosstalk for both HG and LG modes; (2) a lateral misalignment between the transmitter and receiver which leads to crosstalk for LG modes, but might not affect HG0n or HGm0 modes due to axial symmetry; and (3) a rotational misalignment between the transmitter and receiver which causes crosstalk for the HG modes, but does not tend to affect the LG modes due to azimuthal symmetry.

A single-end adaptive-optics (AO) module is experimentally demonstrated to mitigate the emulated atmospheric turbulence effects in a bi-directional quantum communication link, which employs orbital angular momentum (OAM) for data encoding. A classical Gaussian beam is used as a probe to detect the turbulence-induced wavefront distortion in the forward direction of the link. Based on the detected wavefront distortion, an AO system located on one end of the link is used to simultaneously compensate for the forward and backward channels. Specifically, with emulated turbulence and when the probe is turned on, the mode purity of photons carrying OAM l = 1 is improved by ~ 21 % with AO mitigation. We also measured the performance when encoding data using OAM { l = - 1 , + 2 } and { l = - 2 , + 1 } in the forward and backward channels, respectively, at 10 Mbit/s per channel with one photon per pulse on average. For this case, we found that the AO system could reduce the turbulence effects increased quantum-symbol-error-rate (QSER) by ~ 76 % and ~ 74 %, for both channels in the uni-directional and bi-directional cases, respectively. Similar QSER improvement is observed for the opposite direction channels in the bi-directional case.

In this Letter, we experimentally demonstrate beaconless beam displacement tracking for free-space optical communication link multiplexing multiple orbital angular momentum (OAM) beams, where the data-carrying OAM beams are used for position detection. 400 Gbit/s data transmission is demonstrated under emulated lateral displacement of up to ±10 mm with power penalties of less than 3 dB for all channels. Channel crosstalk is reduced by the beam tracking system to below −18 dB. Moreover, we investigate using a Gaussian beacon for beam displacement tracking, and achieve similar channel crosstalk and power penalties, compared with using the beaconless beam tracking.

We experimentally demonstrate and investigate the effect of limited aperture size on a 200-Gbit/s retro-reflected free-space optical link between a ground station and a UAV up to ∼100-m roundtrip distance by multiplexing 2 OAM beams.

We experimentally investigate the performance of a quantum communication link using Laguerre-Gaussian (LG) modes with different radial indices. Quantum symbol error rate (QSER)

We experimentally investigate the effect of multiple scattering on the performance of an 80-Gbit/s orbital angular momentum (OAM) multiplexed optical wireless link regarding both power loss and channel crosstalk.

We experimentally demonstrate adaptive-optics compensation of emulated atmospheric turbulence for an OAM-based quantum communication link with a classical Gaussian beam used as probe. The turbulence-induced quantum-symbol-error-rate is reduced by « 76 % with the compensation.

Light beams can be characterized by their complex spatial profiles in both intensity and phase. Analogous to time signals, which can be decomposed into multiple orthogonal frequency functions, a light beam can also be decomposed into a set of spatial modes that are taken from an orthogonal basis. Such decomposition can potentially provide a tool for spatial spectrum analysis, which may enable stable, accurate, and robust extraction of physical object information that may not be readily achievable using traditional approaches. As a proof-of-concept example, we measure an object’s opening angle using orbital-angular-momentum (OAM) -based complex spectrum, achieving a >15 dB signal-to-noise ratio. Moreover, the dip (i.e., notch) positions of the OAM intensity spectrum are dependent on an object’s opening angle but independent of the opening’s angular orientation, whereas the slope of the OAM phase spectrum is dependent on the opening’s orientation but independent of the opening angle.

Analogous to time signals that can be composed of multiple frequency functions, we use uniquely structured orthogonal spatial modes to create different beam shapes. We tailor the spatial structure by judiciously choosing a weighted combination of multiple modal states within an orthogonal orbital angular momentum (OAM) basis set, creating desired beam intensity "shapes." The weights of the OAM beams to be combined forms a Fourier pair with the spatial intensity distribution in the azimuthal direction of the resultant beam. As an example, we simulate and experimentally create various beam shapes by designing the weights of the combined OAM beams. We also find that 6× higher localized power, as compared to traditional beam combining, could be achieved by coherently combining nine orthogonal OAM beams.

There is a continuing growth in the demand for data bandwidth, and the multiplexing of multiple independent data streams has the potential to provide the needed data capacity. One technique uses the spatial domain of an electromagnetic (EM) wave, and space division multiplexing (SDM) has become increasingly important for increased transmission capacity and spectral efficiency of a communication system. A subset of SDM is mode division multiplexing (MDM), in which multiple orthogonal beams each on a different mode can be multiplexed. A potential modal basis set to achieve MDM is to use orbital angular momentum (OAM) of EM waves. In such a system, multiple OAM beams each carrying an independent data stream are multiplexed at the transmitter, propagate through a common medium and are demultiplexed at the receiver. As a result, the total capacity and spectral efficiency of the communication system can be multiplied by a factor equal to the number of transmitted OAM modes. Over the past few years, progress has been made in understanding the advantages and limitations of using multiplexed OAM beams for communication systems. In this review paper, we highlight recent advances in the use of OAM multiplexing for high-capacity free-space optical and millimetre-wave communications. We discuss different technical challenges (e.g. atmospheric turbulence and crosstalk) as well as potential techniques to mitigate such degrading effects. This article is part of the themed issue ‘Optical orbital angular momentum’.

We propose and simulate the use of the unique intensity gradient of beams carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM) for tracking and localization of an object. We design a three-pixel detector structure to efficiently determine the intensity gradient of an OAM beam. The resultant intensity gradient is then used to calculate the offset direction and distance of the target object from the center of the OAM beam. Our simulation results indicate the following: (i) an OAM-based localization system can have a stronger control signal than the one generated from a Gaussian beam; (ii) an OAM+2 beam may generate a ∼5× stronger localization feedback signal but operates over half the target capture area as an OAM+1 beam; and (iii) our scheme will generally have two orders of magnitude lower accuracy but ∼2× larger coverage area as the distance from the beam emitter to the target increases from 200 to 1000 m.

We experimentally demonstrate beam displacement tracking and correction using orbital-angular-momentum (OAM) beams based position detection over a 400-Gbit/s OAM-multiplexed link. Power penalties

We experimentally demonstrate an OAM-based quantum communication link populated by a classical channel. OAM enables an up to 100-Mbit/s quantum data rate as well as an additional 18.5-dB separation between the quantum and classical channels.

Structured light refers to the generation and application of custom light fields. As the tools and technology to create and detect structured light have evolved, steadily the applications have begun to emerge. This roadmap touches on the key fields within structured light from the perspective of experts in those areas, providing insight into the current state and the challenges their respective fields face. Collectively the roadmap outlines the venerable nature of structured light research and the exciting prospects for the future that are yet to be realized.

Electromagnetic waves carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM) have been used for mode division multiplexing in free-space communication systems to increase both the capacity and the spectral efficiency. In the case of conventional wireless communication links using non-OAM beams, multipath effects caused by beam spreading and reflection from the surrounding objects affect the system performance. This paper presents the results of analysis, simulations, and measurements of multipath effects in a millimetre-wave communication link using OAM multiplexing at 28 GHz. Multipath-induced intra- and inter-channel crosstalk, which are caused by specular reflection from a plane parallel to the propagation path, are analysed and measured. Both the simulation and the experimental results show that an OAM channel with a high OAM number ℓ tends to suffer from both strong intra-channel crosstalk and strong inter-channel crosstalk with other OAM channels. Results of the analysis show that this observation can be explained on the basis of both the properties of OAM beam divergence and the filtering effect at the receiver, which is associated with the spiral wavefront of OAM beams.

We demonstrate a 200-Gbit/s space-division multiplexing system using two Laguerre–Gaussian (LG) beams with different radial indices (LGl=0,p=0 and LGl=0,p=1). With a proper design of the radial change of the demultiplexing pattern, the channel crosstalk could be minimized and both channels could achieve a bit error rate of 3.8×10−3. Moreover, the multiplexing of four LG beams with different azimuthal indices and different radial indices (e.g., LGl=0,p=0, LGl=0,p=1, LGl=1,p=0, and LGl=1,p=1 beams) is also demonstrated with a

In this paper, the generation and steering of beams carrying orbital angular momentum utilizing a custom-designed circular antenna array has been demonstrated at 28 GHz. A steering angle as large as 30 degrees for an orbital angular momentum (OAM) beam has been achieved. The effect of number of antennas and the distance from antennas to the array center to the quality of beam generation and beam steering is investigated through both experiments and simulations. Our results indicate that: (1) As the steering angle increases, the mode purity of the generated OAM beams decreases; (2) Increasing the number of antennas improves the OAM mode purity; (3) For a fixed number of antennas, high mode purity is observed for lower order OAM modes; (4) Placing the antennas farther away from the array center allows for reduced divergence of the generate OAM beams.

To increase system capacity of underwater optical communications, we employ the spatial domain to simultaneously transmit multiple orthogonal spatial beams, each carrying an independent data channel. In this paper, we multiplex and transmit four green orbital angular momentum (OAM) beams through a single aperture. Moreover, we investigate the degrading effects of scattering/turbidity, water current, and thermal gradient-induced turbulence, and we find that thermal gradients cause the most distortions and turbidity causes the most loss. We show systems results using two different data generation techniques, one at 1064 nm for 10-Gbit/s/beam and one at 520 nm for 1-Gbit/s/beam, we use both techniques since present data-modulation technologies are faster for infrared (IR) than for green. For the higher-rate link, data is modulated in the IR, and OAM imprinting is performed in the green using a specially-designed metasurface phase mask. For the lower rates, a green laser diode is directly modulated. Finally, we show that inter-channel crosstalk induced by thermal gradients can be mitigated using multi-channel equalisation processing., 26 pages, 5 figures

Free-space optical communications can play a significant role in line-of-sight links. In general, data can be encoded on the amplitude, phase, or temporal position of the optical wave. Importantly, there are environments for which ever-more information is desired for a given amount of optical energy. This can be accomplished if there are more degrees-of-freedom that the wave can occupy to provide higher energy efficiency for a given capacity (i.e., bits/photon). Traditionally, free-space optical links have used only a single beam, such that there was little opportunity for a wave to occupy more than one spatial location, thereby not allowing the spatial domain to be used for data encoding. Recently, space- and mode-multiplexing has been demonstrated to simultaneously transmit multiple data-carrying free-space beams. Each spatially overlapping mode was orthogonal to other modes and carried a unique amount of orbital-angular-momentum (OAM). In this paper, we consider that OAM modes could be a data-encoding domain, such that a beam could uniquely occupy one of many modes, i.e., 4 modes would provide 4 possible states and double the bits of information for the same amount of energy. In the past, such OAM-based encoding was shown at kHz data rates. We will present the architecture and experimental results for OAM-based data encoding for a free-space 1.55-μm data link under different system parameters. Key features of the results include: (a) encoding on several modes is accomplished using a fast switch, and (b) low bit-error-rates are achieved at >Gbit/s, which is orders-of-magnitude faster than previous results.

In this paper, we explore the potential benefits and limitations of using transmitter lenses in an orbital-angular-momentum (OAM)-multiplexed free-space optical (FSO) communication link. Both simulation and experimental results indicate that within certain transmission distances, using lenses at the transmitter to focus OAM beams could reduce power loss in OAM-based FSO links and that this improvement might be more significant for higher-order OAM beams. Moreover, the use of transmitter lenses could enhance system tolerance to angular error between transmitter and receiver, but they might degrade tolerance to lateral displacement.

We experimentally demonstrate and characterize the\ud performance of a 400-Gbit/s orbital angular momentum\ud (OAM) multiplexed free-space optical link over 120-\ud meters on the roof of a building. Four OAM beams, each\ud carrying a 100-Gbit/s QPSK channel are multiplexed and\ud transmitted. We investigate the influence of channel\ud impairments on the received power, inter-modal\ud crosstalk among channels, and system power penalties.\ud Without laser tracking and compensation systems, the\ud measured received power and crosstalk among OAM\ud channels fluctuate by 4.5 dB and 5 dB, respectively, over\ud 180 seconds. For a beam displacement of 2 mm that\ud corresponds to a pointing error less than 16.7 μrad, the\ud link bit-error-rates are below the forward error\ud correction threshold of 3.8×10-3 for all channels. Both\ud experimental and simulation results show that power\ud penalties increase rapidly when the displacement\ud increases.

We experimentally investigate the potential of using ‘self-healing’ Bessel-Gaussian beams carrying orbital-angular-momentum to overcome limitations in obstructed free-space optical and 28-GHz millimetre-wave communication links. We multiplex and transmit two beams (l = +1 and +3) over 1.4 metres in both the optical and millimetre-wave domains. Each optical beam carried 50-Gbaud quadrature-phase-shift-keyed data and each millimetre-wave beam carried 1-Gbaud 16-quadrature-amplitude-modulated data. In both types of links, opaque disks of different sizes are used to obstruct the beams at different transverse positions. We observe self-healing after the obstructions and assess crosstalk and power penalty when data is transmitted. Moreover, we show that Bessel-Gaussian orbital-angular-momentum beams are more tolerant to obstructions than non-Bessel orbital-angular-momentum beams. For example, when obstructions that are 1 and 0.44 the size of the l = +1 beam, are placed at beam centre, optical and millimetre-wave Bessel-Gaussian beams show ~6 dB and ~8 dB reduction in crosstalk, respectively.

We experimentally demonstrate and investigate the performance of a multi-input-multiple-output (MIMO) free-space optical link employing orbital-angular-momentum multiplexing through turbulent channel. We show that turbulence effects can be mitigated by exploiting spatial diversity and MIMO equalization.

We report a transmission of 2 Gb/s signal over a two-channels, 1.2 meter OAM-multiplexed optical underwater link through water thermal inhomogeneity using 2×2 CMA equalization to mitigate crosstalk and system performance degradation.

We experimentally demonstrate the use of orbital angular momentum (OAM) superposition as basis for the generation of a directed energy beam. Different OAM superpositions are tested with a maximum achieved peak power gain of ∼2.5.

We demonstrate 4-Gbit/s underwater transmission of multiplexed four green OAM beams using directly-modulated 520-nm laser diode. The influence of various channel conditions, including scattering, water currents and temperature gradient (water turbulence) on system performance is investigated.

We experimentally demonstrate a 10 Mbit/s free-space quantum communication link using data encoding on orthogonal Laguerre–Gaussian (LG) modes with the same azimuthal index but different radial indices. Data encoding on two LGlp modes (i.e., for l=0, we encode [“0”, “1”] as [p=0, p=1], and for l=1, we encode [“0”, “1”] as [p=0, p=1]) is demonstrated by employing directly modulated laser diodes and helical phase holograms. The quantum symbol error rate (QSER) of

We experimentally demonstrate spatial multiplexing of an orbital angular momentum (OAM)-encoded quantum channel and a classical Gaussian beam with a different wavelength and orthogonal polarization. Data rates as large as 100 MHz are achieved by encoding on two different OAM states by employing a combination of independently modulated laser diodes and helical phase holograms. The influence of OAM mode spacing, encoding bandwidth, and interference from the co-propagating Gaussian beam on registered photon count rates and quantum bit error rates is investigated. Our results show that the deleterious effects of intermodal crosstalk effects on system performance become less important for OAM mode spacing Δ≥2 (corresponding to a crosstalk value of less than -18.5 dB). The use of OAM domain can additionally offer at least 10.4 dB isolation besides that provided by wavelength and polarization, leading to a further suppression of interference from the classical channel.

We demonstrate the generation of orbital angular momentum (OAM) beams using high-efficient polarization-insensitive phase masks. The OAM beams generated by the phase masks are characterized in terms of their tolerance to misalignment (lateral displacement or tilt) between the incident beam and phase mask. For certain scenarios, our results show that (a) when the tilt angle is within the range of −20 to +20 deg, the crosstalk among modes is less than −15 dB; and (b) lateral displacement of 0.3 mm could cause a large amount of power leaked to adjacent modes. Finally, OAM beams generated by the phase masks are demonstrated over a two-channel OAM-multiplexing link, each channel carrying a 40 Gbit/s data stream. An optical signal-to-noise-ratio (OSNR) penalty of ∼1 dB is measured without crosstalk at the bit error rate (BER) of 3.8 × 10^(−3). With crosstalk, an OSNR penalty of

Laguerre–Gaussian (LG) beams with different azimuthal indices are orthogonal to each other regardless of their radial indices. We investigate the potential advantage and impact of multiplexing LG beams with different azimuthal indices and nonzero radial indices, compared to LG beams with different azimuthal indices but zero radial index. Our simulation results show that LG beams with nonzero radial indices could help in receiving higher signal power in a free-space optical link under a certain short transmission distance range, especially when the receiver has a very limited aperture size. Our experimental demonstration shows a more than 6 dB received power improvement when multiplexing four LG beams with nonzero radial indices.

We demonstrate all-optical division and multiplication of the state order ℓ for data-carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM) beams. We use linear optical transformations between log-polar and Cartesian coordinates to: (i) divide the OAM state order to convert the OAM order from 2ℓ to ℓ (ℓ = −5, −4, …, +4, +5), and (ii) multiply the OAM state order from ℓ to 2ℓ. We analyze the OAM mode purity and the bit-error-rate performance of a classical two-mode OAM multiplexed link for the case of division and multiplication of the OAM state order. The experimental mode purity for halving and doubling OAM state order can reach around 87% and 40%, respectively. We further study the dependence of the OAM mode purity on the displacement of SLMs in simulation. The obtained results show that the transformation for doubling the OAM state order is more sensitive to the increase of the displacement than that for halving the OAM state order. The link bit error rates are below the forward error correction threshold of 3.8 × 10−3 for both channels.

Orbital angular momentum (OAM) has gained interest due to its potential to increase capacity in optical communication systems as well as an additional domain for reconfigurable networks. This is due to the following: (i) coaxially propagated OAM beams with different charges are mutually orthogonal, (ii) OAM beams can be efficiently multiplexed and demultiplexed, and (iii) OAM charges can be efficiently manipulated. Therefore, multiple data-carrying OAM beams could have the potential capability for reconfigurable optical switching and routing. In this paper, we discuss work involving reconfigurable OAM-based optical add/drop multiplexing, space switching, polarization switching, channel hopping, and multicasting.

In this paper, recent studies on the potential challenges for an orbital angular momentum (OAM) multiplexing system were reviewed. The design guideline for a practical OAM multiplexing system were investigated in term of (i) the power loss due to the beam divergence and limited-size receiver, and (ii) the channel crosstalk due to the misalignment between the transmitter and receiver.

In this study, we numerically investigate the effect of Kerr-comb-generated breather soliton pulses on optical communication systems. The breather soliton pulse amplitude and spectrum envelope oscillate periodically in time. Simulations show that the spectrum of each comb line in the breather soliton state has multiple sub-teeth due to the periodic oscillation of the comb spectrum. In the simulation, the comb output is modulated with different formats. We find that the sub-teeth distort quadrature phase-shift-keyed signals but have less of an effect on on-off-keyed signals.

We demonstrate a 280 Gbit/s free-space space-division-multiplexing communications link incorporating a set of independent tilted truncated plane-waves, each generated by a single mode fiber placed at the back-focal plane of a spherical lens. Each of the seven tilted plane-wave channels are encoded with a 40 Gbit/s 16-QAM signal. Our approach comprises two identical linear fiber-arrays placed approximately 5 m apart. As each fiber array is placed at the back-focal-plane of a spherical lens, each fiber array is effectively placed in a conjugate image plane of the other. A channel crosstalk of less than 26 dB is shown, with a bit-error-rate below the FEC threshold of 3.8×10(-3).

We experimentally insert a flexible number of electro-optical (EO) comb lines into a Kerr frequency comb via EO modulation and demonstrate the use of combined Kerr and EO combs as light sources in coherent communications. The number of EO lines inserted into the Kerr comb can be varied by changing the modulation frequency. Additionally, the inserted EO comb is found to have similar coherence to that of the Kerr comb, as indicated by their linewidths. The high coherence of both the Kerr and EO combs has further been demonstrated in a communication experiment in which the comb lines are encoded with 10 Gbaud quadrature phaseshift- keyed signals. The increased number of comb lines after EO modulation indicates the possibility of obtaining more data channels in optical communications. (C) 2017 Optical Society of America

We experimentally demonstrate optical multicasting using Kerr frequency combs generated from a Si3N4 microresonator. We obtain Kerr combs in two states with different noise properties by varying the pump wavelength in the resonator and investigate the effect of Kerr combs on multicasting. Seven-fold multicasting of 20 Gbaud quadrature phase-shift-keyed signals and four-fold multicasting of 16-quadrature amplitude modulation signals have been achieved when low-phase-noise combs are input into a periodically poled lithium niobate waveguide. In addition, we find that the wavelength conversion efficiency in the PPLN waveguide for chaotic combs with high noise is similar to that for low-noise combs, while the signal quality of the multicast copy is significantly degraded. (C) 2016 Optical Society of America

We experimentally generate high-coherence primary Kerr combs with multiple sub-lines by using dual pumps and demonstrate the application of a primary comb state in multichannel communications. We find that more than 10 primary comb lines can be generated within the spectrum of modulation instability gain in our microring resonator. The generation is also verified by numerical simulations and the measured linewidth confirms the high coherence of the generated primary comb lines. We also demonstrate the high-coherence characteristics in a coherent communication experiment, in which each comb line is encoded with 20 Gbaud quadrature phase-shift-keyed signals. (C) 2017 Optical Society of America

The generation of primary sub-comb-lines with high coherence using dual pumps in a SiN microresonator is investigated. A total capacity of 400 Gbit/s has been experimentally demonstrated in coherent communications based on the generated combs.

We experimentally demonstrate 7-fold multicasting of 20-Gbaud QPSK signals based on Kerr frequency combs generated in a silicon nitride microresonator. The effect of high phase-noise comb state on the multicasting performance has also been studied.

We demonstrate high-efficient polarization insensitive OAM generation using integrated phase masks and measure their tolerance to the misalignment of incident beams. An 80 Gbit/s communication link of two OAM channels by using phase masks is demonstrated.