Optical undersea cable systems trends

This paper reviews the evolution of undersea cable technology from the telegraph cables of the mid-nineteenth century to the optical undersea cables of today. Future systems will use optical fiber amplifiers which offer significant technical and economic advantages. Consequently, emphasis is placed on problems associated with the accumulation of small, second-order effects in long lengths of optical fiber and, specifically, their impact on the 5-Gb/s optically amplified transoceanic undersea systems scheduled to be deployed in 1995. Technology options for achieving further capacity increases, among them the use of optical solitons, and trends toward networked undersea cable systems with automatic restoration features are described