Multi-wavelength clock recovery based on a Fabry-Perot Filter and a Quantum-Dot Semiconductor Optical Amplifier

We present an all-optical multi-wavelength clock recovery circuit for operation with short optical data packets at 40 Gb/s and 160 Gb/s. The proposed scheme comprises a low-finesse Fabry-Perot filter (FPF) followed by a quantum-dot semiconductor optical amplifier (QD-SOA) and exploits the memory properties of the passive filtering element and the nonlinear gain characteristics of the homogeneously broadened spectral regions within the QD-SOA in order to acquire the clock signal of multiple incoming wavelengths on a per packet basis. Simulation-based performance analysis shows successful operation both at 40 Gb/s and 160 Gb/s with data packets at four wavelengths entering simultaneously the circuit, yielding a packet clock signal for every incoming data packet with only a few bits rise time and with significantly reduced timing jitter compared to the jitter of the original data.