Alcatel-Lucent uses 8QAM to transmit 300 Gbps over 10,000 km in lab

Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) says its Alcatel-Lucent Submarine Networks (ASN) the undersea cable subsidiary, has demonstrated the transmission of 300 Gbps over 10,000 km using 8QAM. The lab demonstration heralds new capacity possibilities for submarine networks, the company says.

Systems houses are embracing 8QAM optical modulation format for a variety of applications to increase wavelength rates beyond 100 Gbps over existing infrastructure (see, for example, "Coriant CloudWave Optics promises flexible optical transport, greater reach"). ASN's demonstration leveraged 8QAM optical transmission capabilities added to its 1620 SOFTNODE platform.

The trial also used what the company described as "second-generation coherent submarine fiber." (CSF-2). Use of 8QAM could enable submarine cables to transmit more than 15 Tbps per fiber pair, ASN researchers believe.

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