Monolithically integrated tunable laser transmitters for WDM avionics system

Abstract

Tunable laser transmitters for WDM-based local area network in aerospace environment are required to have reliable performance under harsh conditions in addition to being small size, light weight and low power consumption. Similar to commercial WDM telecommunications, an avionic WDM system will consist of lasers at ITU frequencies transmitting signals between WDM optical nodes on an aircraft. The avionic system can be a broadcast-and-select fiber network architecture, or alternatively a metro ring configuration with reconfigurable WDM channel add/drop for example. The link lengths for avionics are typically no more than 100 meters, but a variety of optical connectors and WDM mux/demux between transmitters and receivers contribute to optical losses. For avionic WDM systems, the use of wavelength tunable laser transmitters can significantly enhance system functionality and simplify maintenance and component sparing.