PHASE AND FREQUENCY TRACKING CONSIDERATIONS FOR HETERODYNE OPTICAL COMMUNICATIONS

Abstract

In heterodyne optical communications, phase or frequency tracking is generally needed to avoid performance degradation when signaling in the presence of laser frequency jitter and Doppler shifts. This paper examines a phase-lock loop approach for BPSK and two forms of frequency tracking for MFSK. Using a statistical model for laser frequency instability, the performance of these schemes is calculated by a linear analysis of the tracking loop in the small-error regime.