Design of soliton systems for optimum capacity

This paper identifies some novel approaches to soliton control which may give simple remedies to the limitations imposed by jitter and soliton interaction. Specifically, post-transmission dispersion compensation is shown to reduce significantly the main limitation on long distance transmission. The principle is that the timing jitter can be reduced substantially by employing a dispersive element, post-transmission, with a dispersion of opposite sign equal to one half the system dispersion. The need for filters may be obviated in many cases by this technique, however, compensation combined with fixed frequency filtering will reduce still further these limitations allowing transmission of 10 Gbit s-1 or more over many thousands of km. Similarly phase conjugation either within the system or post-transmission is shown to offer excellent soliton control not only over jitter effects but also soliton-soliton interaction. Potential for solitons in standard fibre systems including dark solitons and very high data rate intermediate length systems are identified.