A Novel Reconfigurable Nonlinear Cascaded MZM Mixer, Amplitude Shift Key Modulator (ASK), Frequency Hopping and Phase Shifter

Abstract

A novel reconfigurable Microwave Photonics (MWP) mixer is presented in this paper, which can be configured to work as a frequency hopper, ASK modulator and phase shifter. This mixer is based on a cascaded Mach–Zehnder Modulator (MZM) structure. A general nonlinear analytical model for the structure is presented. This model is platform free, which means it can be applied to several MWP and integrated MWP platforms. Based on the analytical model, the performance of the structure and output results, such as the optical and electrical spectrum of the structure, are derived in mathematical closed-form expressions. The results of the presented analytical model are compared and evaluated with the results obtained from the simulation to prove the correctness of the analytical model. The presented structure has a simple form, which can be fabricated at a low cost. In addition, according to the obtained results from the analytical model, there is no need to change the arrangement of the structure to operate in any of the mentioned configurations, and the desired function is achievable only by changing the bias voltage of the modulators at the desired frequency.