System margin enhancement in terabit capacity 40 Gb/s systems using an integrated EDFA with dynamic gain equalizer

In this paper we report a fully integrated high power, low noise figure EDFA with DGE and OCM (optical channel monitor) utilizing an imbedded controller and fast control algorithm converging in seconds (limited by OCM response time). The EDFA/DGE is used to demonstrate system margin enhancement in a 24 X 40 Gb/s WDM consisting of 7 EDFAs with 200 km of fiber having 8 dB channel power ripple at the end of transmission line. It is shown that DGE enhances system margin, improving the Q-factor by 2 dB for the worst channel.