Combined Precoding and Volterra Equalization for the Mitigation of Fiber-Optic Nonlinear Channel Impairments

We investigate the performance of a combined Tomlinson-Harashima precoding (THP) and a Volterra nonlinear equalization (VNLE) in a nonlinear fiber-optic communication system aiming at a data rate of 100 Gbits/sec. THP-VNLE is compared with a feed-forward VNLE and a combined VNLE decision-feedback equalizer (DFE) by means of performance and computational complexity. Two different transmission scenarios, both using a 25 GBaud 16QAM signal, are introduced, and the performance of the different equalizers is assessed qualitively, and via Monte-Carlo simulations for the measurement of the BER.