Patent ID: 7110677

Claim:
A time division multiplexed optical communication receiver for a received time division multiplexed optical signal, comprising: a light sensitive detector for detecting at least a first optical pulse stream of the time division multiplexed optical signal; the time division multiplexed optical signal having a plurality of interleaved optical pulse streams, each optical pulse stream including a plurality of optical pulses; an optical hybrid coupled to the light sensitive detector and configured to coherently mix the first optical pulse stream and a second optical pulse stream, pulses of the first optical signal and second optical pulse streams configured to simultaneously impinge upon the detector; wherein the first optical signal is a part of the time division multiplexed optical signal; and wherein the optical hybrid and light sensitive detector are configured to provide the receiver with dual functions of, (i) first optical pulse stream selection and (ii) data recovery for first optical pulse stream, and wherein the second optical pulse stream is a framing pulse stream of the time division multiplexed optical signal with a pulse period that is N times larger than a period of the received time division multiplexed optical signal, wherein N is the number of interleaved pulsed optical streams within the recived time division multiplexed signal.