TapTechNews September 16th news, during the Next Generation Wireless Fronthaul Standard Industry Forum held during the 25th China International Optoelectronic Exposition (CIOE 2024) (September 11-13), the MFH50 project team of the International Optoelectronic Committee (IPEC) released the first 50 Gb/s fronthaul optical module technical standard in the industry.
This standard is led by China Telecom Research Institute to formulate, covering 50 Gb/s dual-fiber bidirectional and single-fiber bidirectional gray optical modules, using the SFP56 miniaturized packaging form, with a power consumption of no more than 2 watts, supporting operation in an ambient temperature range of -40°C to 85°C, and having new features such as rate downward compatibility with 25 Gb/s and SNR monitoring.
According to the China Telecom Research Institute, with the further expansion of the air interface bandwidth in the 5G-A and 6G eras, the wireless spectrum resources in the high-frequency band will gradually be released. Facing this trend, the current mainstream 10 Gb/s and 25 Gb/s fronthaul optical modules are difficult to meet the future large bandwidth requirements. The China Telecom Research Institute started the research work on the next-generation fronthaul network and optical module in 2022, united with many units such as Huawei, Guangxun, Hisense, HiSilicon, and Source Photonics, developed the 50 Gb/s fronthaul optical module and completed the interoperability verification, promoting the iterative development of the wireless fronthaul network and optical module technology.
TapTechNews learned from the official of the China Telecom Research Institute that for the potential problems such as chromatic dispersion and multipath interference existing in the fronthaul link, the China Telecom Research Institute, together with Huawei and Shanghai Orange Technology, proposed a method to monitor the health degree of the fronthaul link by defining the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). In order to realize this scheme, a high-precision SNR estimation algorithm is integrated in the DSP chip of the optical module, which can control the monitoring accuracy within ±0.5 dB. The paper formed by the relevant research results was officially accepted by the 2024 European Conference on Optical Communication (ECOC 2024). The proposal of this scheme enables operators to perceive the operation quality of the fronthaul optical path in real time, identify potential risks in advance, and improve the efficiency and stability of network operation and maintenance.