Patent ID: 7853157

Claim:
A system for the Brillouin fiber amplification based polarization insensitive coherent (homodyne) detection of a phase shift keying optical communication signal, comprising: a Sagnac loop comprising one of a single mode fiber span and a spun fiber span; a Brillouin pump coupled to the Sagnac loop; wherein the Sagnac loop and the Brillouin pump are collectively operable for amplifying a carrier component of the phase shift keying optical communication signal and separating the amplified carrier component of the phase shift keying optical communication signal from a baseband of the phase shift keying optical communication signal; and a phase shift keying hybrid coupled to the Sagnac loop and the Brillouin pump; wherein the Sagnac loop, the Brillouin pump, and the phase shift keying hybrid are collectively operable for extracting a local oscillator from the phase shift keying optical communication signal via the amplified carrier component of the phase shift keying optical communication signal to create a virtual local oscillator, and wherein the system is insensitive to the state of polarization of the phase shift keying optical communication signal.