Patent ID: 7899098

Claim:
An optical transmitter comprising: N laser diodes, wherein N is a positive integer that is equal to or greater than 1, each laser diode being configured to receive an electrical drive signal that causes the laser diode to produce an optical signal having a light output power (LOP) level, each laser diode having a cathode and an anode, and wherein a respective forward voltage (V FWD ) signal passes between the anode and the cathode of each respective laser diode; and a laser diode driver integrated circuit (IC) comprising: N laser diode driver circuits, each driver circuit generating an electrical drive signal that is output via one or more electrical contact pads of the driver IC to a respective one of the laser diodes to cause the respective laser diode to produce a respective optical signal having a respective LOP level; at least one V FWD monitoring circuit configured to acquire and measure the V FWD signal passing between the anode and cathode of at least one of the N laser diodes, wherein first and second input terminals of the at least one V FWD monitoring circuit are electrically connected to the anode and cathode, respectively, of the at least one N laser diodes and the V FWD monitoring circuit outputs a V FWD output signal indicative of the measured V FWD level; at least one analog-to-digital converter (ADC), the ADC receiving said V FWD output signal and converting it to a digital V FWD signal; and a laser diode driver controller configured to receive said digital V FWD signal and having logic configured to control, based on said digital V FWD signal, the laser diode driver IC.