World’s fastest photodetector has 70 GHz bandwidth

Designed to support next-generation optical communications networks using 400 Gbit/s or 1 Tbit/s coherent detection-based optical transmission, u2t Photonics has developed what it says is the world’s fastest balanced photodetector, with a bandwidth of 70 GHz.

Gail Overton

July 12, 2013

Designed to support next-generation optical communications networks using 400 Gbit/s or 1 Tbit/s coherent detection-based optical transmission, u²t Photonics (Berlin, Germany) has developed what it says is the world’s fastest balanced photodetector, with a bandwidth of 70 GHz.

The optical front end of the BPDV3120R photodetector consists of a monolithically integrated balanced photodetector chip using waveguide-based indium phosphide (InP) technology to enable extremely high bandwidth. They are integrated onto a single InP chip and optimized to produce guaranteed linear frequency response, even at very high power levels. The coaxial single-ended output can detect up to 64 Gbaud polarization diversity x-QAM signals with repeatable common mode rejection ratio, linearity, and optical input power specifications for error-free operation in long-haul transmission systems at data rates of 400 Gbit/s and beyond. It can also be used in telecommunications test and measurement equipment. Contact Jens Fiedler at [email protected].

About the Author

Gail Overton

Senior Editor (2004-2020)

Gail has more than 30 years of engineering, marketing, product management, and editorial experience in the photonics and optical communications industry. Before joining the staff at Laser Focus World in 2004, she held many product management and product marketing roles in the fiber-optics industry, most notably at Hughes (El Segundo, CA), GTE Labs (Waltham, MA), Corning (Corning, NY), Photon Kinetics (Beaverton, OR), and Newport Corporation (Irvine, CA). During her marketing career, Gail published articles in WDM Solutions and Sensors magazine and traveled internationally to conduct product and sales training. Gail received her BS degree in physics, with an emphasis in optics, from San Diego State University in San Diego, CA in May 1986.