Abstract

Optical sub-carrier multiplexing (SCM) is a modulation scheme where multiple signals are multiplexed in the RF domain and transmitted on a single optical carrier. A significant advantage of SCM is that microwave devices are more mature than optical devices: the stability of microwave oscillators and the frequency selectivity of microwave filters are much better than their optical counterparts. While a popular application of SCM technology is analog CATV distribution,¹ SCM is also considered for use in high-speed digital transmission because of its flexible bit rate granularity and bandwidth efficiency.

© 2002 Optical Society of America