On Bit-Loading for Discrete Multi-Tone Transmission Over Short Range POF Systems

A novel bit-loading approach is proposed for the discrete multi-tone (DMT) transmission over short range polymer optical fiber (POF) systems. First of all, from the extract signal-to-noise ratio table of quadrature amplitude modulation for different desired bit error rates (BER), a new linear approximation (LA) expression is introduced to implement bit-loading for DMT systems. Then, based on water-filling concept, the performance bounds and optimal power allocations for the classical and the proposed bit-loading algorithms in Gaussian low-pass channel models are derived. Consequently, introducing the measured channel parameters of step-index (SI)-POF channels with different transmission distances, the theoretical performance bounds are computed and the practical transmission rates are simulated. Simulation results show that the proposed LA expression based bit-loading achieves higher transmission rate than classical modulation gap based bit-loading. Both algorithms use a sub-optimal Chow algorithm with a constant power allocation and an iterative process. Finally, real DMT transmissions over SI-POFs are implemented in order to verify the proposed method. The LA expression based bit-loading outperforms the modulation gap based bit-loading in DMT transmission systems over different transmission distances. Moreover, experimental results show that the longer fiber length, the higher performance gain with LA expression based bit-loading. In the comparisons, for a 50 m SI-POF transmission, the transmission rate in DMT system with LA expression based bit-loading is improved by 5% with the same experimental setups for a given BER at 1 ×10 - 3 and by 10% for a 100 m length.