Deep learning based digital backpropagation demonstrating SNR gain at low complexity in a 1200 km transmission link

A deep learning (DL) based digital backpropagation (DBP) method with a 1 dB SNR gain over a conventional 1 step per span DBP is demonstrated in a 32 GBd 16QAM transmission across 1200 km. The new DL-DPB is shown to require 6 times less computational power over the conventional DBP scheme. The achievement is possible due to a novel training method in which the DL-DBP is blind to timing error, state of polarization rotation, frequency offset and phase offset. An analysis of the underlying mechanism is given. The applied method first undoes the dispersion, compensates for nonlinear effects in a distributed fashion and reduces the out of band nonlinear modulation due to compensation of the nonlinearities by having a low pass characteristic. We also show that it is sufficient to update the elements of the DL network using a signal with high nonlinearity when dispersion or nonlinearity conditions changes. Lastly, simulation results indicate that the proposed scheme is suitable to deal with impairments from transmission over longer distances. (C) 2020 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement