Evaluation and mitigation of polarization mode dispersion impairments in high-speed transmission systems

We first compare different polarization mode dispersion (PMD) models for evaluating PMD impairments. We show that, compared with the all-order PMD model, most of the known first- and second-order PMD models overestimate the PMD induced distortions. Then we discuss various PMD mitigation techniques. We show that modulation formats have a big impact on choosing the most effective PMD compensation techniques. Not only do the benefits of using PMD compensators (PMDCs) depend on modulation formats, but the designing of a PMDC is largely affected by modulation formats as well. Some multi-channel PMD mitigation techniques for wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) systems are also discussed.