A Laser-Forwarded Coherent Transceiver in 45-nm SOI CMOS Using Monolithic Micror

Abstract

For the silicon photonic links to meet the target bit error rate (BER), the laser source must output enough optical power to overcome the optical channel loss and limited receiver sensitivity. Combined with poor wall-plug efficiency, this optical power requirement makes the electrical power consumed by the laser source a significant portion of the link energy cost. This article proposes a laser-forwarded coherent link that greatly reduces the required laser optical power by averaging optical path