A complex physical process that combines degenerate and non-degenerate four-photon mixing describes two- and three-pump interaction in highly nonlinear optical fibers. High confinement architectures with two- and three pumps will be investigated in order to develop a new, unifying theory and practice of parametric fiber processors. Parametric fiber processors provide a set of fundamentally new functions that include banded signal manipulation and conjugation, rate-independent regeneration, switching and amplification. The feasibility of qualitatively new types of broadband wavelength converters with tuning speeds that are independent of tuning distance will be studied using this new technology. The proposed work will explore fundamental limits of multiple-pump interactions in highly nonlinear fibers and their impacts on both device and system performance. General multiple-pump design rules will be outlined for the first time. The physics of modulation instability coupling in imperfect high-confinement fiber will be studied and used to devise mitigation procedures for practical processing devices. Two- and three-pump interactions in birefringent, dispersion-fluctuating and dissimilar fiber constructs will be investigated both theoretically and experimentally. Generalized methods for Brillouin suppression and unimpaired idler generation will be investigated using both passive and active methods. The use of practical fiber parametric processors will be studied both in conventional, phase-independent and coherent communication links. The feasibility of all-optical ring architecture utilizing banded wavelength conversion and transport penalty reversal will be investigated using a two-pump fiber parametric device. Performance of bit-level switching in fiber parametric processor will be explored with newly developed theoretical and experimental tools.
