Patent ID: 7369300

Claim:
An optical amplifier pre-emphasis and equalization method for alleviating the optical amplifier ripple penalty experienced in an optical communications system, such as a wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) optical communications system carrying a plurality of channels or wavelengths, the method comprising: capturing and storing residual gain ripple information related to an optical amplifier within memory disposed within an optical amplifier module, wherein the capturing and storing is performed during factory calibration; using system software disposed outside of the optical amplifier module comprising the optical amplifier disposed within the optical amplifier module, retrieving the residual gain ripple information related to the optical amplifier from the memory disposed within the optical amplifier module; using the system software, computing the pre-emphasis or equalization required for each channel or wavelength in order to compensate for residual gain ripple using the retrieved residual gain ripple information; and using at least one of a variable optical attenuator (VOA), a reconfigurable blocking filter (RBF), and a dynamic gain equalizer (DGE), pre-emphasizing or equalizing each channel or wavelength.