The temperature dependency of EDFAs in the 1480 nm

pumping conguration
Ali H. El-Astal
*
, Abdel Hakeim M. Husein, Majdi S. Hamada
Al-Aqsa University, Physics Department, P.O. Box 4051, Gaza, Gaza Strip, Occupied Palestinian Territory
Received 24 January 2007; received in revised form 14 May 2007; accepted 18 May 2007
Abstract
A theoretical study of the temperature-dependent gain and noise gure eects on erbium-doped ber ampliers (EDFAs) pumped at
1480 nm is investigated, solving the propagation equations related to two level systems. The solution of these equations is based on the
population and temperature dierence among amplication levels. The temperature-dependent propagation equation considered is used
to determine the gain and noise gure eects on EDFAs. The population dierence depends on pump and signal powers, Boltzmann
factor K
B
, cross-sections, noise gure (NF) and Er
3+
concentration. The temperature-dependent gain and noise gure eect the EDFA
length are numerically obtained for the temperature range of 20 C to +60 C. All of the analyses consist of the amplied spontaneous
emission (ASE) eect.
2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
Rare earth doped ber ampliers and laser are impor-
tant tools in understanding and designing new optical
devices. Erbium-doped ber ampliers (EDFAs) are attrac-
tive devices for single-mode bers in optical communica-
tion systems in the 1530 nm wavelength band which is
known as a third window for ber optic communication.
EDFAs have many advantages such as high gain and low
noise in optical communication networks. EDFAs are
characterized by gain which depends on temperature and
this feature is very interesting in the modern optical trans-
mission systems which use wavelength division multiplex-
ing (WDM) [1]. Various temperature values in published
works have then been used to experimentally nd the gain
at optimum amplier lengths by analytical solution of the
rate equation derivation [25]. The temperature-dependent
gain in EDAFs have been studied theoretically and exper-
imentally for 980 nm and 1480 nm with the EDFAs of dif-
ferent lengths [6]. An ecient dual pumping scheme for the
L-band EDFA has been presented to reach a high gain and
low noise performance in the double-pass conguration.
The system with narrow band reectors proves to be the
best [7]. Genetic algorithms have been applied to EDFAs
for obtaining the maximum gain bandwidth and optimiz-
ing the pumping wavelength, ber length and signal power
by solving the rate equation and power propagation [8].
The performance of hybrid ber amplier HFA has been
analyzed and the gain control method has been demon-
strated experimentally. HFAs showed a better transmission
performance line amplier than did EDFAs [9]. Tempera-
ture-dependent analytic equations have been investigated
in terms of the Boltzmann factor [10]. Temperature-depen-
dent noise gure (NF) eects have not been studied in
terms of the Boltzmann factor. The signal gain was calcu-
lated using the rate equation model by developing the the-
oretical analysis of the amplication characteristics of
EDFAs [11]. A conguration of reection L-band EDFA
pumped by 980 and 1480 nm has shown a great improve-
ment in the noise gure and the gain spectra characteristic
compared to the conguration pumped by only 1480 nm.
The gain and noise gure are enhanced in the region from
1565 to 1615 nm when they used the part of the reection
by making use of a ber loop mirror to reect the
amplied spontaneous emission (ASE) backward into the
0030-4018/$ - see front matter 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.optcom.2007.05.038
*
Corresponding author. Tel.: +970 599378644; fax: +970 82079303.
E-mail address: a_elastal@alaqsa.edu.ps (A.H. El-Astal).
www.elsevier.com/locate/optcom
Optics Communications 278 (2007) 7176
EDFA [12]. The study of the gain on the temperature
dependency has been carried out by including the tempera-
ture and cross-section factors in the rate equation for the
EDFAs gain pumped at 1480 nm [1316]. In this work, the
propagation equations, enhanced by counting the tempera-
ture eects and the numerical results for the temperature
ranges of 20 C to +60 C are used to derive an analytical
equation for the signal gain and noise gure eects in
EDFAs. The ASEis taken into consideration, but the excited
state absorption (ESA) eect is neglected for simplicity.
2. Theory
The single-mode ber doped Er
3+
ions can be consid-
ered homogeneously broadened in a two-level amplica-
tion system and also characterized by the population
inversion densities N
1
and N
2
of the lower (ground) and
the upper (metastable) levels, respectively, as shown in
Fig. 1. These types of systems have a long life time s and
rates of stimulated of absorption and emission S
ij
where
i = 1, 2,. . . and j = 1, 2,. . .. The spontaneous emission
between the ground and metastable levels is related to the
pump absorption and stimulated emission rates R
a;e
p
. The
population of the Er
3+
ions in the metastable energy state
can be split into two sublevels N
2+
and N
2
, respectively.
We can consider them as a single energy level. In the ther-
mal equilibrium, the sublevels is arranged as a function of
temperature and governed by Boltzmans distribution law.
This type has been studied by Berkdemir et al. [10,15,16].
b
N
2
N
2

nr
C

nr
exp
DE
2
K
B
T
_ _
1
Here K
B
is Boltzmans constant, T is the temperature in
Kelvin, C

nr
and C

nr
are the nonradiative rates that corre-
spond to the thermalization process and DE
2
= E
2+
E
2
[17]. On the basis of the energy level diagram as in Fig. 1,
the rate equation for Er
3+
population density can be writ-
ten as follows:
dN
2
dt
R
a
p
N
1
R
e
p
N
2
C

nr
N
2
C

nr
N
2
2
dN
2
dt
S
12
N
1
S
21
N
2
N
2
c C

nr
N
2
C

nr
N
2
3
dN
1
dt
R
e
p
N
2
R
a
p
N
1
S
21
N
2
S
12
N
1
N
2
c 4
Under the condition of the steady state regime, where all of
the level populations are time invariant, i.e., dN
i
/dt = 0
(i = 1, 2),
N
2
s r
a
p
N
1
br
e
p
N
2
_ _
I
p
ht
p
r
a
s
N
1
r
e
s
N
2
_ _ I
s
I

ASE
_ _
ht
s
_ _
5
where r
a;e
s
is the stimulated absorption and emission cross-
section of the signal beam and r
a;e
p
is the absorption and
emission cross-section of the pump beam, respectively,
t
p,s
is the pump and the signal frequencies. I
s
and I
p
are sig-
nal and pump intensities and I

ASE
is the forward (+) and
backward () amplied spontaneous emission (ASE) of
propagating optical intensities. Let b
a;e
p

htp
sr
a;e
p
and
b
a;e
s

hts
sr
a;e
s
where h is the Planck constant. So we can rewrite
Eq. (5) as follows:
N
2
N
t

Ip
b
a
p

IsI

ASE

b
a
s
1 b
Ip
b
a
p
b
Ip
b
e
p
1 b g
IsI

ASE

b
a
s
1
6
where N
t
(r) is the total dopant Er
3+
density distribution
N
t
(r) = N
1
(r) + N
2
(r) + N
2+
(r) or N
t
= N
1
+ (1 + b)N
2
in terms b. N
1
and N
2
are assumed to be symmetric and
g is the ratio between the signal emission and absorption
cross-sections g r
e
s
=r
a
s
.
By dening I
s
(z, r) = P
s
(z)f
s
(r) and I
p
(z, r) = P
p
(z)f
p
(r)
where P
s
(z) and P
p
(z) are the signal and pump powers,
and f
s
(r) and f
p
(r) are the normalized signal and pump
transverse intensity proles, respectively. Also dene
I

ASE
z; r P

ASE
zf

ASE
r where f

ASE
r is the normalized
amplied spontaneous emission intensity proles and
P

ASE
z is ASE the power at the position z and has to be
determined from the forward and backward spectrum,
P

ASE
P

ASE
P

ASE
7
Assuming f
s
r f
p
r f

ASE
r f r for the following
derivations. The signal, pump and ASE powers will evolve
according to the following propagation equations:
dP
s
z
dz
2p
_
1
0
I
s
r; zr
e
s
N
2
r r
a
s
N
1
rrdr 8
dP
p
z
dz
2p
_
1
0
I
p
r; zbr
e
p
N
2
r r
a
p
N
1
rrdr 9
dP

ASE
z
dz
2ht
s
_
1
0
2pr
e
s
N
2
rf

ASE
rrdr
2p
_
1
0
r
e
s
N
2
r r
a
s
N
1
rP

ASE
zf

ASE
rrdr 10
By substituting N
t
= N
1
+(1 + b)N
2
into Eq. (8), and
dividing r
a
s
=r
a
s
, then the signal power becomes
Fig. 1. Two-level amplication system and main transitions of the erbium
ion [10,16].
72 A.H. El-Astal et al. / Optics Communications 278 (2007) 7176
dP
s
dz
2pr
a
s
P
s
z
_
1
0
f r r
e
s
=r
a
s
1 bN
2
N
t

_
rdr
11
dP
s
dz
2pr
a
s
P
s
zg 1 b
_
1
0
N
2
rf rrdr P
s
za
s
12
where a
s
2pr
a
s
_
1
0
N
t
rf rrdr is the absorption
constant of the signal beam. To solve the integral of
Eq. (12), we will use Eq. (5) by multiplying both sides
by rdr and integrating between 0 and 1, we obtain
the resulting equations:
_
1
0
N
2
rrdr
_
1
0
sI
p
ht
p
r
a
p
N
1
br
e
p
N
2
_ _
rdr

_
1
0
sI
s
ht
s
r
a
s
N
1
r
e
s
N
2
_ _
rdr

_
1
0
sI

ASE
ht
s
r
a
s
N
1
r
e
s
N
2
_ _
rdr 13
Comparing Eq. (13) and Eqs. (8)(10), we will get
_
1
0
N
2
rrdr
s
2pht
p
dP
p
dz

s
2pht
s
dP
s
dz

s
2pht
s
dP

ASE
dz
2pr
e
s
_
1
0
N
2
rf rrdr 14
We will dene the connement factor:
C A
_
1
0
N
2
rf rrdr
__
1
0
N
2
rrdr 15
where A is the eective doped area; therefore Eq. (14)
becomes
_
1
0
N
2
rf rrdr

s
2p
A
C
2pr
e
s
_ _
1
ht
p
dP
p
dz

1
ht
s
dP
p
dz

dP

ASE
dz
_ _ _ _
16
For simplicity, we will consider the co-propagating system
in the z direction, and inserting Eq. (16) into Eq. (12), then
multiplying the rst part from the right-hand side by ht
s
/
ht
s
, we get
dP
s
dz
2pr
a
s
P
s
z
ht
s
ht
s
g1b

s
2p
A
C
2pr
e
s
_ _
1
ht
p
dP
p
dz

1
ht
s
dP
p
dz

dP

ASE
dz
_ _ _ _
_ _
P
s
za
s
17
Dening P
int
s

htsA4sCr
e
s

sr
a
s
C1gb
as the intrinsic saturation power
density of the signal beam and as a function of
temperature.
At the boundary condition in the +ve direction
P

ASE
0 0, P

ASE
L 0 and P

ASE
0 0 is the more
accurate solution of the propagation equation, and then
the gain can be obtained by the following equation [16]:
Gexpa
s
L
exp
ht
s
P
int
s
P
p
0 P
p
L
ht
p

P
s
0
ht
s
G1
P

ASE
L
ht
s
_ _ _ _
18
We can measure P
out
s
and P
out
p
for a given P
in
s
and P
in
p
for the
maximal pumping eciency, the
dPs
dPp
0, we have the out-
put pump power as follows:
P
o
p

1
R
g
b
a
p

b
b
e
p
_ _ 19
The maximum pumping eciency becomes P
out
p
P
0
p
where P
0
p
depends on both b and g parameters. For maxi-
mum gain G G
max

P
o
s
P
i
s
can be obtained theoretically by
the following [16]:
t
p
t
s
P
i
s
P
o
p
G
max
1 ln G
max
t
p
t
s
P

ASE
P
o
p

r
a
p
r
a
s
_ _ _ _
1
P
i
p
P
o
p
ln
P
o
p
P
i
p
_ _
20
The ASE noise spectrum uses the noise gure given or as
input parameter. In the practical case, the ASE is presented
at input of the doped ber; therefore the amplied input
ASE P
i
ASE
spectral density can be added to the amplied
output ASE spectral density P
o
ASE
, so
P
o
ASE
P
amp
P
i
ASE
G 21
where G is the gain and P
amp
is the spectral density of ASE
generated by the doped ber. For input ASE gives the sig-
nal spontaneous beat noise (1/G) limited noise gure as a
function of the signal gain and input and output ASE spec-
tral densities. Therefore,
NF
1
G

P
o
ASE
k
s

Ght
s

P
i
ASE
k
s

ht
s
22
where 1/G is the beat noise, P
o
ASE
k
s
is the output ASE
spectral density (Watt/Hertz) at signal wavelength,
P
i
ASE
k
s
is the input ASE spectral density at signal wave-
length, t
s
is the frequency of the signal wavelength and
h = 6.626 10
34
J S is the Planck constant. For each sig-
nal wavelength, the noise gure can be calculated in deci-
bels (dB) and is given by
NF dB 10log
10
1
G

P
o
ASE
k
s

Ght
s

P
i
ASE
k
s

ht
s
_ _
23
3. Calculation and discussion
The results given in this section have been studied as a
temperature-dependent gain performance analysis by
Berkdemir et al. [10,16]. According to the previous papers,
our additional analysis is to present the temperature depen-
dency of noise gure on EDFAs pumped by 1480 nm. The
approximate equation of the maximum gain can be proved
numerically using f(r), f r expr
2
=w
2
0
=pw
2
0
, the
A.H. El-Astal et al. / Optics Communications 278 (2007) 7176 73
dopant distribution N
t
(r), N
t
(r) exp(r
2
/w
2
)/pw
2
in the
Gaussian forms, and the eective core area pw
0
= 33
35 lm
2
, where w
0
is the optical mode spot size. We chose
the width ratio w/w
0
to be 0.3 between Gaussian dopant
distribution and transverse intensity proles. For nding
P
o
p
L with dierent temperature values for ber lengths
up to 45 m, R should be calculated. Using f(r) and N
t
(r)
for the relevant ber parameters gives the signal absorption
constant a
s
an arbitrary value. The relevant ber parame-
ters depend on the temperature, 20 C, +20 C and
60 C, as shown in Table 2. For simplicity, the energy dif-
ference between levels of metastable is considered as
300 cm
1
at room temperature. The ber parameters val-
ues are selected for an Al/P-silica erbium-doped ber
amplier and presented in Table 1 [19]. The cross-section
ratio of the signal beam depends on temperature. The
parameter g was calculated at dierent temperatures and
presented in Table 2. A more accurate relation between
emission and absorption cross-sections could be taken
from McCumbers theory and has been used [18]. More-
over, Table 2 shows the calculations results for various out-
put powers P
o
p
L and intrinsic powers P
int
s
; these P
o
p
L and
P
int
s
depend on the parameters g and b as a function of the
temperature.
For numerical calculations, we choose an Al/P-silica
erbium-doped ber as a gain medium of an amplier oper-
ated at the pump wavelength k
p
= 1480 nm and the input
pump power P
i
p
0 is xed about 30 mW at the length
L % 0. The signal wavelength k
s
= 1530 nm and its power
P
s
(0) is taken as 10 lW as listed in Table 1 [19]. Further-
more, we used the OptiAmplifer 4.0 software as a simula-
tion program [20] for generating P
i
p
L only, and the
setup of the basic system is shown in Fig. 2.
The temperature-dependent signal gain with dierent
ber lengths is illustrated for dierent temperatures 20,
+20 and +60 C in Fig. 3. It is noted that the signal gain
for a given signal pump decreases with increasing tempera-
tures when the ber length L 6 27 m and the gain increases
when L P27 m. As shown in Fig. 3, the temperature insen-
sitive length is L = 30 m for the relevant pump and signal
power, where the temperature-dependent gain curve is fol-
lowed opposite direction about the temperature change at
the temperature insensitive length.
It was previously reported that the temperature insensi-
tive length is 180 m at 1.536 lm because the temperature-
dependent gain coecient of the input signal is dierent
[6]. It can also be seen that the temperature insensitive
lengths at dierent temperatures are longer than the opti-
mum ber length where the temperature-dependent gain
coecient behaves in the opposite direction in the temper-
ature insensitive length. The optimal ber length, L
opt
should be obtained by using Eq. (18):
L
opt

1
a
s
lnG
max

ht
s
P
int
s
P
p
0 P
p
L
ht
p

P
s
0
ht
s
G
max
1
_ _

ASE
L
ht
s
__
24
where G
max
is the maximum gain.
Table 1
The ber parameters and symbols used in the numerical calculations
Symbol Denition Value
r
e
s
Signal emission cross-section 5.7 10
25
m
2
r
a
s
Signal absorption cross-section 6.6 10
25
m
2
r
e
p
Pump emission cross-section 0.87 10
25
m
2
r
a
p
Pump absorption cross-section 2.44 10
25
m
2
s Life time 10.8 ms
N Erbium concentration 3.86 10
24
m
3
k
s
Signal wavelength 1530 nm
k
p
Pump wavelength 1480 nm
t
s
Signal frequency 1.96 10
14
Hz
t
p
Pump frequency 2.027 10
14
Hz
P

ASE
L Copropagating ASE power 0.15 mW
a
s
Signal absorption constant 0.5 m
1
L Fiber length 045 m
P
i
p
Input pump power 30 mW
Copropagation ASE power is calculated numerically [10,16]. The values of
parameters are selected for an Al/P-silica erbium-doped ber [19].
Table 2
The relevant parameters as a function of temperature [10,16]
C b g P
o
p
L P
int
s
20 0.306 0.845 2.308 mW 0.493 mW
+20 0.357 0.862 2.311 mW 0.474 mW
+60 0.406 0.879 2.314 mW 0.451 mW
Single Signal Laser
Pump Laser Pump Coupler
Isolator
Isolator
Er. Fiber
Receiver
Fig. 2. Simulation setup for measurement of co-operating P
i
p
L in EDFA
by the OptiAmplifer 4.0 software [16].
0 10 20 30 40 50
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
20
o
C
20
o
C
60
o
C
Fiber length L (m)
S
i
g
n
a
l

G
a
i
n

(
d
B
)
-
Fig. 3. Temperature-dependent signal gain analysis, the Gain as a
function of ber length in the copropagating ASE power of 0.15 mW
and when P
i
p
0 30 mW and P
s
(0) = 10 lW.
74 A.H. El-Astal et al. / Optics Communications 278 (2007) 7176
Noise gure calculations have been investigated using
Eq. (23).
Firstly, the input signal power is taken as 10 lW. Fiber
parameters are as follows: ber core radius = 2.7 lm,
Erbium radius = 1.0 lm, Numerical aperture = 0.31.
The calculation algorithm has been used as follows: the
geometrical factor is LP
01
(linear polarized) [21], numerical
iteration = 400 and relative tolerance = 10
5
.
Here, concentration quenching is homogeneous and
excited state absorption (ESA) is neglected in this
calculation.
In Table 3, the temperature dependence of the noise g-
ure was calculated at the maximum gain and the optimum
length of erbium-doped ber at various temperatures. It
was noted that the variation of noise gure and the
optimum length is in accordance with the dierent
temperatures.
In Fig. 5, the noise gure rapidly increases for 06 m
length and there is no signicant eect of temperature
dependency at dierent temperatures, while it is still low
at lengths greater than 6 m. There is little noise eect at
various temperatures in this region (<6 m) because the gain
and noise gure is low enough due to the length of the
EDFA, so to speak, the population inversion ratio is very
low. If the EDFA length is low enough, the population
inversion is very low so that the absorption and emission
rates are low but we can nd the temperature-dependent
gain (temperature-dependent absorption and emission)
and noise eect. It was noted that the variation of noise
gure via the EDFA length in spectral contribution of
copropagating ASE power is given in Fig. 4. For dierent
temperatures, the noise gure is nearly the same but some
uctuations are shown for lengths up to 45 m.
4. Conclusion
An accurate model has been introduced including the
temperature eects for noise gure of the erbium-doped ber
amplier. The amplied spontaneous emission (ASE) has
beentakenintoaccount as a part of the noise gure. The tem-
perature dependence of the noise gure on various tempera-
tures was taken into consideration which shows that the
performance of EDFA depends on the temperature. The
analytical solution of the propagation equations has also
been derived for the temperature range 20, +20 and
+60 Cfor nding the gainandoptimumber lengthat max-
imum gain. In practical applications, the dependence of the
noise gure on the ber length is such that the noise gure
is low when the ber length is less than 10 m.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Professor S. O

zsoy and
Dr. C. Berkdemir for their useful comments and revisions
Table 3
The gain and noise gure in dB at the various temperatures and at the optimum erbium-doped ber lengths (The values of maximum signal gains are taken
from Ref. [16])
1480 nm pumping conguration
Temperature (C) Maximum signal gain (dB) Noise gure (dB) Optimum ber length (m)
20 26.71 7.185 22.72
+20 26.24 7.535 24.54
+60 25.82 7.840 26.36
0
0
10 20 30 40 50
20
o
C
20
o
C
60
o
C
A
S
E
p
o
w
e
r

(
m
W
)

Fiber length L (m)
1
2
3
4
-
Fig. 4. Temperature-dependent ASE power analysis. The change of the
copropagation ASE power via erbium-doped ber length.
0 10 20 30 40 50
20
o
C
20
o
C
60
o
C
N
o
i
s
e

F
i
g
u
r
e

(
d
B
)
Fiber length L (m)
10
8
6
4
2
0
-
Fig. 5. Temperature-dependent noise gure analysis. The change of noise
gure via erbium-doped ber length in the spectral contribution of
copropagating ASE power given in Fig. 4.
A.H. El-Astal et al. / Optics Communications 278 (2007) 7176 75
on the original version of the manuscript paper. Moreover,
the authors are indebted to Dr. C. Berkdemir for his com-
putational assistance.
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