Computer Engineering Commons^™

Bit Error Rates For Ultrafast Apd Based Optical Receivers: Exact And Large Deviation Based Asymptotic Approaches, Peng Sun, Majeed M. Hayat, Abhik K. Das

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Exact analysis as well as asymptotic analysis, based on large-deviation theory (LDT), are developed to compute the bit-error rate (BER) for ultrafast avalanche-photodiode (APD) based optical receivers assuming on-off keying and direct detection. The effects of intersymbol interference (ISI), resulting from the APD's stochastic avalanche buildup time, as well as the APD's dead space are both included in the analysis. ISI becomes a limiting factor as the transmission rate approaches the detector's bandwidth, in which case the bit duration becomes comparable to APD's avalanche buildup time. Further, the effect of dead space becomes significant in high-speed APDs that employ thin …