Impact of local oscillator intensity noise and the threshold level on the performance of a {2×2} and {3×3} phase-diversity ASK receiver

The impact of local oscillator intensity noise and the threshold level on the performance of the {2×2} and the {3×3} phase-diversity amplitude-shift keying (ASK) receiver has been investigated for the first time for non-Gaussian statistics. Exact equations are derived for the bit-error-rate (BER), taking into account the non-Gaussian statistics and the statistical dependency of the relative intensity noise (RIN) in the receiver branches. The results differ substantially from the case in which a priori Gaussian statistics were assumed. The sensitivity penalty of the receivers is calculated with respect to the performance of an ideal heterodyne ASK receiver for a BER of 10^-9. It is shown that for a minimum sensitivity penalty the threshold level should be chosen in relation to the local oscillator power and the intensity noise level