Optical Fiber Communication: Challenges and Opportunities

A special issue of Photonics (ISSN 2304-6732). This special issue belongs to the section "Optoelectronics and Optical Materials".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 July 2025 | Viewed by 881

Special Issue Editors

Department of Electrical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Interests: fiber-optic communications; free-space optical communications; optical networks; digital signal processing; physical-layer security
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Nokia Bell Labs, Paris-Saclay, 91620 Nozay, France
Interests: optical wireless communications; ultra-wideband optical fiber communications; hollow-core fiber transmission; advanced digital signal processing
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Tyndall National Institute, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
Interests: wireless communications; fiber-optic communications; optical access networks; digital signal processing; information theory
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Optical fiber communication plays a crucial role in modern telecommunications, underpinning the backbone of internet and communication networks worldwide. With the rapid growth of many new network services, including 5G and beyond, cloud computing, big data, and virtual reality, the existing optical networks are facing challenges from various aspects such as capacity, latency, cost, and energy consumption. To meet the stringent requirements brought forth by these new applications, researchers have been devoted to developing devices, algorithms, and architectures for high-performance optical fiber communication.

This Special Issue, entitled “Optical Fiber Communication: Challenges and Opportunities”, is dedicated to showcasing the latest explorations and advancements in this research field. We are pleased to invite you to submit your latest research findings to this Special Issue, which welcomes both original research articles and reviews. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Fiber–optic communications;
  • Digital and optical signal processing for optical fiber communications;
  • Devices and components for optical fiber communications;
  • Subsystems for optical transmission;
  • Hybrid fiber/free-space optical communications;
  • Optical channel models and characteristics;
  • Optical networks;
  • 5G/6G fronthaul;
  • Passive optical networks;
  • Wavelength-division multiplexing techniques;
  • Space-division multiplexing techniques;
  • Cost- and energy-saving techniques;
  • Physical layer security in optical networks;
  • Integrated sensing and communication in optical fibers.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Zhouyi Hu
Dr. Yang Hong
Dr. Xing Ouyang
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Photonics is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • fiber–optic communications
  • optical networks
  • digital and optical signal processing
  • optical devices and components
  • optical subsystems and systems.

Benefits of Publishing in a Special Issue

  • Ease of navigation: Grouping papers by topic helps scholars navigate broad scope journals more efficiently.
  • Greater discoverability: Special Issues support the reach and impact of scientific research. Articles in Special Issues are more discoverable and cited more frequently.
  • Expansion of research network: Special Issues facilitate connections among authors, fostering scientific collaborations.
  • External promotion: Articles in Special Issues are often promoted through the journal's social media, increasing their visibility.
  • e-Book format: Special Issues with more than 10 articles can be published as dedicated e-books, ensuring wide and rapid dissemination.

Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.

Published Papers (1 paper)

Order results
Result details
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:

Research

8 pages, 3054 KiB  
Communication
Performance Limitations Due to Intra-Core Crosstalk and Nonlinear Interference Noise in Weakly Coupled Multi-Core Fiber Transmission Systems
by Wencheng Li, Lian Xiang and Xiaoliu Li
Photonics 2025, 12(3), 186; https://doi.org/10.3390/photonics12030186 - 24 Feb 2025
Viewed by 305
Abstract
Multi-core fiber (MCF) is expected to be a good candidate to overcome the capacity limit of single-mode single-core fiber. However, only linear inter-crosstalk was considered in the performance of MCF. In this study, the performance of the transmission channel in terms of the [...] Read more.
Multi-core fiber (MCF) is expected to be a good candidate to overcome the capacity limit of single-mode single-core fiber. However, only linear inter-crosstalk was considered in the performance of MCF. In this study, the performance of the transmission channel in terms of the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) in weakly coupled MCF transmission systems is investigated by taking into account the effect of intra-core nonlinear interference noise (NLIN) and nonlinear inter-core crosstalk (NICXT). The SNR is calculated with various MCF system parameters to assess corresponding transmission performance. The results show that the SNR cannot always be improved by increasing the transmitted power in both the SCF and MCF systems. NICXT can deteriorate the performance of the MCF system, obviously, especially when the transmitted power is smaller than the threshold power. Furthermore, this influence is more marked with a small coupling coefficient. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Optical Fiber Communication: Challenges and Opportunities)
Show Figures

Figure 1

Back to TopTop