Course Syllabus, Logistics, Policies & Procedures

Howdy!

Welcome to Optical Communication Systems (EE 6310). This course deals with the operating principles of optical communications systems and fiberoptic communication technology.

Topics covered include:

  1. overview of optical communication systems
  2. review of optics
  3. the characteristics of optical fibers
  4. optical waveguides
  5. review of digital communications
  6. optical sources and transmitters
  7. optical detectors and receivers
  8. optical amplifiers
  9. noise and detection
  10. dispersion in optical communication systems
  11. optical link design

Last revised 07/30/2002 at 9:28 PM.

Objectives

Upon completion of EE 6310, students are expected to be familiar with the principles and technology of optical communication systems, and to be able to design a point-to-point optical communications link, including power, noise and risetime/jitter budgets.

Course Topics

The course material is divided into eleven modules. Short descriptions of the individual modules, and the expected time duration of each module, follow:

  1. Overview of optical communication systems (1 week)

    This module provides an overview of the course's rationale and topics. Good references include Agrawal, Fiber-Optic Communication Systems, 3rd Edition, Chapter 1, Dutton, Understanding Optical Communications, Chapter 1, and John G. Nellist, Understanding Telecommunications and Lightwave Systems, Chapter 17.

  2. Review of optics (1 1/2 weeks)

    This lightning review of optics will cover the basics of physical optics: Interference, diffraction, coherence and polarization. If this is your first exposure to optics, please refer to Hecht, Optics, 3rd Edition. A fourth edition is forthcoming. For a deeper understanding of physical optics, please consider taking EE 6317. Some of the topics covered in this review, such as diffraction, coherence and polarization, are also covered in EE 6334.

  3. Characteristics of optical fibers (1 week)

    This module covers propagation in multimode and single-mode fibers, coupling into and out of fibers, attenuation, group-velocity dispersion, optical nonlinearities, polarization-mode dispersion, fiber manufacturing, air-core fibers, and test equipment.

  4. Optical waveguides (1 week)

    This module is an overview of the distinctive characteristics of the propagation of light in conducting and dielectric waveguides.

  5. Review of digital communications (1 week)

    A summary of important concepts of digital communications, including baseband and broadband digital transmission, Shannon's coding theorem, bit signaling and bit-group signaling methods, bit error rate and bit-group error rate, and time-division and frequency-division multiplexing. For a deeper understanding of digital communications, please consider taking EE 6352.

  6. Optical sources and transmitters (1 1/2 weeks)

    This module reviews the physics of light emission and amplification in semiconductors, light-emitting diodes, semiconductor lasers (including both edge-emitting and surface-emitting lasers), and optical transmitters. This module, and the two following modules, are reviews of some of the material that is covered in EE 6329.

  7. Optical detectors and receivers (1 1/2 weeks)

    This module covers the physics and technology of the detection and demodulation of light, including photoconductors, photodiodes, phototransistors, and receiver systems.

  8. Optical amplifiers (1 1/2 weeks)

    Optical amplifier technologies discussed here include semiconductor laser amplifiers, erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (EDFAs), praseodymium-doped fiber amplifiers, planar amplifiers, Raman amplifiers and optical repeaters.

  9. Noise and detection (1 1/2 weeks)

    This module covers noise arising from the properties of fibers, transmitters, receivers and amplifiers, as well as the determination of the bit error rate in terms of system parameters.

  10. Dispersion in optical communication systems (1 1/2 weeks)

    This module covers dispersion in multimode fibers, dispersion in single-mode fibers, dispersion-induced pulse broadening in single-mode fibers, system implications, and real-life examples.

  11. Optical link design (1 week)

    An overview of the design process for a point-to-point optical link.

Syllabus

  1. Overview of optical communication systems
  2. Review of optics
  3. Characteristics of optical fibers
  4. Optical waveguides
  5. Review of digital communications
  6. Optical sources and transmitters
  7. Optical detectors and receivers
  8. Optical amplifiers
  9. Noise and detection
  10. Dispersion in optical communication systems
  11. Optical link design

Your Instructor

photo taken August 2000

The course will be taught by Dr. Cyrus D. Cantrell, who received his baccalaureate degree from Harvard University and his Doctor of Philosophy and Master of Science degrees from Princeton University. His primary research fields are computational nonlinear optics as applied to the design of communications systems, statistical properties of local-area and wide-area network traffic, and computational electromagnetics as applied to the design of very-high-speed, deep-submicron VLSI circuits. His primary teaching fields are Computer Organization and Design, Broadband Packet Networks, Optical Networks, Electromagnetic Engineering, Nonlinear Optics, Computational Electromagnetics and Computational Methods in Engineering. In recognition of his research accomplishments, Dr. Cantrell has been elected a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the Optical Society of America, and the American Physical Society. Recently Dr. Cantrell was awarded an IEEE Third Millennium Medal. He has published over 100 technical papers, and is the author of Modern Mathematical Methods for Physicists and Engineers, which is published by the Cambridge University Press. Dr. Cantrell is a licensed Professional Engineer in the State of Texas.
 

Textbooks

Required Textbook:

Recommended Textbooks:

How to Acquire Textbooks:

Technical Requirements

In order to optimize your experience in this course, we recommend some basic hardware and software.

Hardware:

Software:

 

Course Logistics

Format:

Prerequisites

The prerequisites for this semester's instance of EE 6310 are:

Assignments, exams and grades

Grades

Relative weights used in determining grades:

Letter grades will be assigned according to the following rules based on the overall score:

Assignments and Exams

Proctored Exams

All exams will be proctored. If an exam is not taken on the UT-Dallas campus, then, upon completion of the exam, the answer sheets must be sent to the instructor by e-mail, fax, or by post. Students are strongly encouraged to take the exams on the UT-Dallas campus. For those who cannot come to UT-Dallas, examination centers will be also be set up at various locations depending on need.

University Policies

NOTICE OF POLICY ON CHEATING:

Students are expected to be above reproach in all scholastic activities. Students who engage in scholastic dishonesty are subject to disciplinary penalties, including the possibility of failure in the course and dismissal from the University. "Scholastic dishonesty includes but is not limited to cheating, plagiarism, collusion, the submission for credit of any work or materials that are attributable in whole or in part to another person, taking an examination for another person, any act designed to give unfair advantage to a student or the attempt to commit such acts." Regents' Rules and Regulations, Part One, Chapter VI, Section 3, Subsection 3.2, Subdivision 3.22.

Since scholastic dishonesty harms the individual, all students, and the integrity of the University, policies on scholastic dishonesty will be strictly enforced.

WITHDRAWING FROM COURSE & REFUNDS

UTD is guided by a state-mandated refund policy. The amount refunded depends on whether or not you remain enrolled in other courses. If you drop a class and later withdraw, your refund will reflect the combination of dropped classes and the remaining hours at the time of withdrawal.

The last date to withdraw from a Fall 2002 course with a grade of "W" is October 23. For other important dates, please refer to the Fall 2002 calendar.