Interferometric noise in optical code division multiple access systems

Interferometric noise (IN) (also referred to as beat noise) is one of the most detrimental noise sources in optical code division multiple access (OCDMA) systems dominating the effect of multiple access interference (MAI). General classification of IN is provided supported by survey of OCDMA systems that suffer from beat noise, theoretical framework that permits an assessment of the level of system penalty owing to beat noise is presented. Furthermore, as an illustration, the paper demonstrates the impact of particular type of IN on 2-D time-wavelength OCDMA systems for both physical and data link layers