Patent ID: 7603037

Claim:
An optical data transmission system comprising: a. a data transmission portion including: (i) an optical comb generator for generating a comb of discrete optical tones; (ii) the data transmission portion being arranged in a plurality of segments, each segment of the data transmission portion including at least: (a) an array of lasers, with each laser in the array of lasers in each segment being injection locked to an optical tone in the comb generated by the optical comb generator; (b) a data source providing data for modulating the light generated by a majority but less than all of the lasers in the array of lasers in each segment; and (c) a frequency shifter for frequency shifting at least one laser in the array of lasers in each segment, the frequency shifter shifting cooperating with the at least one laser in the array of lasers in each segment to generate a frequency-shifted unmodulated reference signal which occurs in the frequency domain between the discrete optical tones generated by the optical comb generator; (iii) the data transmission portion also including multiplexers for combining outputs of the modulated lasers and the frequency-shifted unmodulated reference signal and the comb of discrete optical tones onto at least two optical paths; b. a data receiving portion including: (i) at least two demultiplexers for demultiplexing signals on the at least two optical paths; (ii) the data receiving portion being arranged in a plurality of segments, each segment of the data receiving portion including at least: (a) a photodetector for detecting demultiplexed modulated signals from at least one of the demultiplexers; (b) a photodetector for detecting demultiplexed unmodulated signals from at least another of the demultiplexers; (c) a filter array associated with each photodetector in each segment, the filter array selecting a desired modulated tone and an associated desired unmodulated tone between the discrete optical tones generated by the optical comb generator; and (d) a mixer for detecting the filtered demultiplexed modulated signals and the filtered demultiplexed unmodulated signals to recover at least a portion of the data provided by the data source.