Patent ID: 7031614

Claim:
An optical network in which a continuous wave transmitted via an optical fiber from a light source arranged at one node is input to an optical intensity modulator at the other node, the optical intensity modulator then modulating the continuous wave using an externally input data signal, the resulting modulated signal light being transmitted to a next node, said one node comprising a polarization scrambler converting the continuous wave output by the light source into scrambled light with a zero degree of polarization and then outputting the scrambled light, said polarization scrambler comprising an optical pulse generator that generates optical pulses with an intensity waveform repetition period T/2and an electrical field repetition period T in which the same intensity waveform is repeated every repetition period T/2 and in which phase is inverted every repetition period T/2, and an orthogonal polarization delay unit which receives each of said optical pulses, separates the optical pulse into two optical pulses with orthogonal states of polarization, and relatively shifts the temporal position of one of the two optical pulses from that of the other optical pulse by (2n−1)T/4 (n is a natural number) to generate light in which each pulse is polarized orthogonally to a succeeding pulse, said optical pulse generator comprising a light source that generates a continuous wave and an optical intensity modulator which has an input signal φ(t) (t denotes time) and such a transmission characteristic that for a particular input signal φ 0 , output electrical fields are expressed by: E (φ( t )−φ 0 )=− E (−φ( t )−φ 0 ) the optical intensity modulator being driven by the input signal φ(t) having such a repetition period T that: φ( t )−φ 0 =φ( t−T )−φ 0 =−φ( t−T/ 2)−φ 0 (≠0), the optical pulse generator modulates uses said input signal φ(t) of the repetition period T to modulate said continuous wave to generate optical pulses with an intensity waveform repetition period T/2 and an electrical field repetition period T which provide electrical fields expressed by: E ( t )= E (φ( t )), said optical intensity modulator having a periodic transmission characteristic for the input signal, and said optical intensity modulator is a Mach Zehnder type optical intensity modulator and subjects paths into which optical power is split, to phase modulation using sinusoidal signals with opposite phases which have a time average difference φ 0 and cause a phase difference π on a peak-to-peak basis, and comprising polarization-dependent optical intensity modulator being used as an optical intensity modulator at said other node, wherein when a bit rate of a data signal from said other node is defined as B (bps), an electric signal driving the polarization scrambler at said one node and said data signal are asynchronous, and a polarization scrambling frequency f sc (Hz) of said scrambled light is such that 1.7B<f sc <2B.