Monolithically integrated 80-Gb/s AWG-based all-optical wavelength converter

We present a monolithically integrated all-optical wavelength converter. The converter consists of four semiconductor optical amplifiers for four separate inputs and an arrayed-waveguide grating. Error-free wavelength conversion with reasonable penalties for a 27-1 pseudorandom binary sequence was shown for a single input 80-Gb/s signal. The device exploits cross-gain/phase modulation in a single amplifier and selects with a filter the blue-chirped spectrum of the new wavelength signal in order to speed up the device response. This device has a dimension of 1.7×3.5 mm2 and it can be operated to convert simultaneously four 80-Gb/s wavelength channels