Optical Fiber Technology 19 (2013) 400–404

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Optical Fiber Technology

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Shaped offset quadrature phase shift keying (SOQPSK) modulation scheme and
its application in optical wavelength-division multiplexed (DWDM) transmission
Ning Zou, Benxiong Huang, Zhengguang Xu ⇑
Department of Electronics and Information Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, PR China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper presents a new quaternary modulation scheme called SOQPSK. The principle on the optical
Received 13 December 2012 SOQPSK generation is derived and analyzed, which is implemented by traditional Mach–Zehnder
Revised 14 March 2013 modulators. The performance of the optical SOQPSK modulated system is evaluated and compared with
Available online 31 May 2013
those of quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK) and offset QPSK (OQPSK) modulation systems via
simulation, in terms of spectral efficiency, receiver sensitivity and density DWDM transmission perfor-
Keywords: mance. Simulations show that the novel modulation scheme improves spectral efficiency for DWDM
Shaped offset quadrature phase shift keying
transmission and provides better transmission performance than QPSK.
(SOQPSK)
Modulation scheme
Published by Elsevier Inc.
Spectral efficiency

1. Introduction and available modulation schemes are compared. We draw a con-

clusion of this paper in Section 4.
In high-capacity wavelength-division multiplexed (WDM) opti-
cal systems, the advanced modulation formats is demonstrated as
2. Principle of proposed SOQPSK modulation scheme
an effective scheme for achieving higher spectral efficiency. Re-
cently, the optical minimum shift keying (MSK) format is studied
SOQPSK is a kind of quaternary continuous phase modulation
for its constant amplitude and continuous phase [1–4] and exhibits
(CPM) which is developed to further band-limit an OQPSK signal
narrower power spectrum than binary phase shift keying (BPSK).
[10]. OQPSK is a constant-envelop modulation that has no p phase
However, the spectral efficiency of MSK is lower than QPSK since
shifts, and therefore has a much higher spectral containment than
the latter is a quaternary modulation scheme, and the demodula-
non-offset QPSK when transmitted over band-limited nonlinear
tion scheme for MSK based on coherent detection is not compatible
channels. The frequency-shaping pulse for SOQPSK in its CPM
with the existing demodulation scheme for QPSK [5].
representation is rectangular, and it lasts one bit interval [11].
Therefore, we try to find some quaternary modulation scheme
Fig. 1 shows the configuration of the proposed optical SOQPSK
with continuous phase, narrow power spectrum and compatible
transmitter. The upper arm has a MZM (MZM1), whereas the lower
demodulation scheme with QPSK. Fortunately, SOQPSK satisfies
arm has another MZM (MZM2) and a phase shifter to make the two
all the requirements. This new modulation scheme was adopted
arms have a 90 phase difference. Both MZM1 and MZM2 are biased
as part of a military standard [6] but never used in optical
at the transmission null point, and they are driven by the even-
communication. The best demodulation scheme for SOQPSK signal
numbered-bit and odd-numbered-bit data streams respectively.
is iterative decoding [7] but it is also compatible with the demod-
The even-numbered-bit and odd-numbered-bit data sequences are
ulation scheme for QPSK with a little performance loss [8].
transmitted at the bit rate of R/2, where R is the system bit rate.
In this paper, we propose the modulation scheme for optical
The upper arm and lower arm can be also called as in-phase (I)
SOQPSK and provide its demodulation performance using dual-
arm and quadrature-phase (Q) arm in such that optical transmitter.
polarized coherent detection [9]. The outline of the paper is as
The optical field of the achieved transmitted signal can be given as
follows. In Section 2, we introduce the generation of SOQPSK signal
that is similar to QPSK signal based on Mach–Zehnder modulators Et ¼ Aej2pf0 t  cosðpaðtÞÞ þ j  Aej2pf0 t  cosðpbðtÞÞ ð1Þ
(MZMs). In Section 3, the spectral efficiency, receiver sensitivity
and DWDM transmission performance between proposed scheme where A is the input optical amplitude, f0 is the laser frequency, a(t),
b(t) are the modulated signal which drive the MZM1 and MZM2
respectively.
⇑ Corresponding author. The different signals in I and Q arms generate the various mod-
E-mail address: xray@mail.hust.edu.cn (Z. Xu). ulation formats. It is worth mentioning that the complexity of the

1068-5200/$ - see front matter Published by Elsevier Inc.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.yofte.2013.05.002
 N. Zou et al. / Optical Fiber Technology 19 (2013) 400–404 401

Fig. 1. Configuration of proposed optical SOQPSK transmitter.

SOQPSK transmitter is similar to that of the QPSK, OQPSK and MSK
transmitter. For example, the input even-numbered-bit data se-
quence is ‘‘010011’’ and odd-numbered-bit data sequence is
‘‘110001’’, they are at a bit rate of R/2. The input waveform to
the MZMs in the transmitter is shown in Fig. 2 to generate different
modulation formats where Fig. 2a shows the input waveform to
the MZMs for the available modulation formats. The rectangular
pulses drive I and Q arms to generate QPSK and OQPSK signals,
where the I arm is delayed by Tb (where Tb = 1/R is half the single
line symbol period Ts) when the modulation scheme is OQPSK.
The amplitude of rectangular pulse driving to the MZMs is either
0 or Vp to provide either 0 or p phase shift in each arm according
to the bit (0 or 1) of the data streams. The MSK is considered as
a kind of carried-suppressed return-to-zero (CSRZ) OQPSK modula-
tion format. The triangular waveforms together with the rectangu-
lar pulses drive I and Q arms can generate MSK signal. The
characteristic of the SOQPSK format is its gradually altered phase
when I or Q bits change. The SOQPSK is defined by
ESOQPSK ¼ AðtÞ cos½2pf0 t þ /ðt; aÞ
where
Z t X
þ1
p Vp/4 to 0 and back to Vp/4 (or from V3p/4 to Vp and back to V3p/4)
/ðt; aÞ ¼ ai gðs  iT b Þ ds; 1 < t < þ1
2 1 i¼1
The information-bearing phase /(t, a) is determined by the 3-ary
sequence ai = 1, 0, 1 and the unit-area frequency pulse g(t). The
3-ary sequence ai is related to the true input binary (±1) data
sequence ~
a ¼ ð. . . ; a2 ; a1 ; a0 ; a1 ; a2 ; . . .Þ by
ai1 ðai  ai2 Þ
ai ¼ ð1Þiþ1
2 It is worth to mention that the driving signal shown in Fig. 2b is
The frequency pulse g(t) is simply a unit-area delta function for
OQPSK and is a unit-area rectangular function for SOQPSK.
In the generation of OQPSK signal, rectangular pulse is used to
drive the MZMs. To generate the proposed SOQPSK signal, we
use the graduated waveform whose transition time of different
electrical level is Tb to drive the MZMs in the modulator. The input
waveforms to the MZMs is shown in Fig. 2b for the generation of
proposed SOQPSK signal. The standard SOQPSK signal is a CPM sig-
nal with constant-envelop. Generating this signal based on the
optical transmitter in Fig. 1 is difficult at the driving signal to the
MZMs. So we propose a transition SOQPSK signal which called
style-A SOQPSK (SOQPSK-A) signal, and call the standard SOQPSK
signal as style-B SOQPSK (SOQPSK-B) signal that are shown in
Fig. 2b. In order to generate the SOQPSK-A signal, we only alter
the transition time of different electrical level to Tb. The amplitude
of the waveforms maintains either 0 or Vp to provide either 0 or p
phase shift in each arm according to the bit (0 or 1) of the data
streams. To generate the SOQPSK-B signal, we should adjustment
the waveforms based on the SOQPSK-A. The amplitude of the
waveforms maintains either Vp/4 or V3p/4 to provide either p/4 or
3p/4 phase shift in each arm according to the bit (0 or 1) of the data
ð2Þ streams. When the binary bit information transforms to another,
the constancy waveform of another arm transforms to triangular
waveform (the amplitude of the waveform linear changes from
ð3Þ in a bit interval Tb with the same gradient according to the bit 0
(or 1)) which is marked by red dashed round box in Fig. 2b.
The differences between the two styles of SOQPSK signal is
shown in Fig. 3. The trace of SOQPSK-A is a square whereas the
trace of SOQPSK-B is a circle. The SOQPSK-B signal has the constant
envelope compared to the SOQPSK-A signal. In addition, the
SOQPSK-B signal has smoother phase shift than the SOQPSK-A
signal.
ð4Þ
generated by an arbitrary waveform generator (AWG). The driving
signal of SOQPSK becomes more complex than non-continuous

Fig. 2. (a) Input waveforms to the MZMs for the available different modulation formats. (b) Input waveforms to the MZMs for the proposed different style of SOQPSK
modulation formats.
402 N. Zou et al. / Optical Fiber Technology 19 (2013) 400–404

Fig. 3. (a) Constellation and phase shift of optical SOQPSK-A signal. (b) Constellation and phase shift of optical SOQPSK-B signal.

phase modulation signal such as QPSK and OQPSK, whereas it pro-

vides a more compact spectrum as shown in the sections below.

3. Simulations

Simulations have been done among SOQPSK, OQPSK and QPSK

modulation formats. The simulation set-up is shown in Fig. 4. We
measure the transmission performances of these four phase mod-
ulation schemes at dual-polarized 100 Gb/s over 80-km standard Fig. 5. Configuration of off-line processor.
single mode fiber (SMF, attenuation: 0.2 dB/km, CD: 16 ps/
(nm km), nonlinear index coefficient: c = 2.6  1020 m2/W
(Aeff = 80 lm2)) per loop without inline dispersion compensation. The optical spectra of these phase modulation formats are
The laser frequency is 193.1 THz and the laser line-width is shown in Fig. 6. OQPSK and QPSK have the same spectrum envelop.
200 kHz. We assume the Erbium-doped fiber amplifier (EDFA, The time delay has no effect on the spectrum envelop. The main-
noise figure: 4 dB) exactly compensate the signal attenuation by lobe of the MSK is broader than those of OQPSK and QPSK, but it
the SMF. has the lower side-lobe. The spectrums of SOQPSK (both
We deploy a coherent detection to receive these phase modula- SOQPSK-A and SOQPSK-B) have the same main-lobe as the OQPSK
tion signals. The configuration of the off-line processor is shown in and QPSK and have the side-lobe nearly approaching MSK. In depth
Fig. 5. We add the nonlinear (NL) compensation unit based on the
traditional subsystems in a digital coherent receiver [9]. NL
0
compensation unit is used to self phase modulation (SPM). WDM MSK
OQPSK
degradation such as cross phase modulation (XPM) and four wave -10 SOQPSK-A
mixing (FWM) did not compensation in our off-line processor. SOQPSK-B
QPSK
Ps(f)/dBm

-20

-30

-40

-50
-4 -2 0 2 4
(f-f )T/Hz
c

Fig. 4. Simulation set-up. Fig. 6. Optical spectrum of phase modulation formats.

 N. Zou et al. / Optical Fiber Technology 19 (2013) 400–404 403

6
QPSK QPSK
-3
5 OQPSK OQPSK

Power penalty/dB
SOQPSK-A SOQPSK-A
SOQPSK-B SOQPSK-B

LOG (BER)
4
-3.5
3
-4
2

1
-4.5
0
0 20 40 60 80 -4 -2 0 2 4
Residual dispersion/ps/nm Span input power/dBm
(a) (b)
Fig. 7. (a) Residual dispersion tolerance for the phase modulation formats. (b) Nonlinearity tolerance for the phase modulation formats.

of SOQPSK spectrums, the second-order side-lobe of SOQPSK-B has
the lower than that of SOQPSK-A. The reason is that SOQPSK-B has
the constant envelope which has been shown in Fig. 3.
In order to evaluate the dispersion tolerance provided by these
quaternary phase modulation schemes, the power penalty is mea-
sured when residual dispersion exists. Fig. 7a shows that SOQPSK
(both SOQPSK-A and SOQPSK-B) formats have better tolerance
with nearly 1 dB power penalty when the residual dispersion is
80 ps/nm. In our simulation, the power penalty increases faster
in the QPSK and OQPSK modulation schemes when we change
the residual dispersion larger than 80 ps/nm, for the reason that
the increased residual dispersion can have a more significant effect
on the lower spectrum efficiency modulation schemes. In this
point of viewing, the optical SOQPSK modulation schemes show
the better capacity for residual dispersion tolerance.
To learn about the resistance to the fiber nonlinearity in these
phase modulation formats, we mainly investigate the inter-chan-
nel nonlinearity of the four modulation schemes. In the simulation,
the fiber link is 2 spans of 80 km SMF without inline dispersion
compensation with 6 channel WDM and 50 GHz channel spacing.
The dispersion, polarization mode dispersion (PMD) and SPM are
compensated by the channel equalization in the off-line processor
shown in Fig. 5. We study the XPM and FWM tolerance by chang-
ing the average input power of the fiber link. Fig. 7b shows the cal-
culated bit error rate (BER) versus the fiber launch power. It can be
found that the nonlinearity tolerance of the SOQPSK-B scheme is
better than those QPSK and OQPSK formats when the fiber input
power is larger than 2 dBm whereas the nonlinearity tolerance of
the SOQPSK-A scheme is worse than others. The nonlinearity toler-
ance is deteriorated when the modulation scheme is non-constant
envelop. For the SOQPSK-A signal has non-constant envelop and
the SOQPSK-B signal has constant envelop with narrower spectrum
density, the SOQPSK-A scheme decreases the nonlinearity toler-
ance and the SOQPSK-B scheme increases the nonlinearity
tolerance.
Then we simulated the receiver sensitivity and loop transmis-
sion performance of these phase modulation formats. Fig. 8a shows
the receiver power requirements of the simulations in a back-to-
back set-up. OQPSK, QPSK formats have similar receiver sensitivity
performance. The performance of SOQPSK (both SOQPSK-A and
SOQPSK-B) maintains similar with QPSK and SOQPSK where the
performance of SOQPSK-B is a bit better than SOQPSK-A.
Fig. 8b shows the BER vs. transmission distance of 100 GHz
dual-polarized with 6 channel WDM and 50 GHz channel spacing.
The dispersion, polarization mode dispersion (PMD) and SPM are
compensated by the channel equalization in the off-line processor
shown in Fig. 5. WDM degradation such as cross phase modulation
(XPM) and four wave mixing (FWM) did not compensation in our
off-line processor. SOQPSK-A and OQPSK bridge approximately
30 km more than QPSK at the same BER. SOQPSK-B bridges approx-
imately 10 km more than SOQPSK-A and OQPSK. This is because
the signal with constant envelope and continual phase is more
effective in optical fiber transmission. Therefore, SOQPSK has the
better transmission performance and narrower spectrum than
QPSK.
4. Conclusion
We implement optical SOQPSK modulation scheme using tradi-
tion external optical modulators. The new modulation scheme im-
proves the spectral efficiency compared with QPSK and OQPSK
modulation formats. The investigation on the receiver sensitivity
and transmission performance demonstrates the feasibility of the
proposed scheme, which can outperform the transmission perfor-
mance about 30–40 km with higher spectral efficiency.

QPSK
-3 OQPSK -2.5
SOQPSK-A
LOG (BER)

LOG (BER)

SOQPSK-B -3
-3.5

-3.5
-4 QPSK
OQPSK
-4 SOQPSK-A
SOQPSK-B
-4.5
-4.5
-30 -29 -28 -27 -26 100 150 200 250 300
Received Power/dBm Distance/km
(a) (b)
Fig. 8. (a) Receiver sensitivity for the phase modulation formats. (b) Transmission performance for 6 channel 50 GHz spaced WDM phase modulation formats.
404 N. Zou et al. / Optical Fiber Technology 19 (2013) 400–404
Acknowledgment
This research is partially supported by the National Basic
Research Program (973) of China (Grant No. 2010CB328300).
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