9622298 Li The Department of Electrical Engineering at Rochester Institute of Technology will purchase a phase and amplitude measurement systems which will be dedicated to support research in engineering. The equipment will be used for several research projects, including in particular: 1. "A Novel FM Microwave Fiber-Optic Link for Antenna Remoting and Phased Arrays' 2. "An Ultra Wideband Microwave Fiber-Optic Transmitter Based on Laser Diodes with Short External Cavity" 3. "All-Optical SCM and WDM-SCM Multi-Access Networks" These research projects share a key innovation in generating microwave/millimeter-wave subcarriers on an optical carrier exploiting "instabilities" of nonlinear optical systems. Specifically, the microwave/millimeter-wave subcarriers are generated all optically using the optical current controlled oscillator (CCO) which systematically exploits inherent nonlinear dynamics, mainly the formation of periodic orbits. The phase and amplitude noise of the subcarrier determines, to a large extent, the signal-to-noise ratio (bit-error rate) of the analog (digital) links or communication networks. The equipment requested will be used in combination with theoretical investigations to determine the dependence of the amplitude and phase noise as functions of device parameters and operating conditions. Subsequently strategies for reducing these noises will be formulated. Ultimately, low-noise optical CCO's will be inserted in microwave fiber-optic links as well as SCM and WDM-SCM multi-access fiber-optic networks. ***
