Radio over fibre (RoF) transmission systems, characterised by having elements of free-space radio and optical fibre, are expected to find an increasing role in telecommunication networks over the next decade, due to their ability to provide operational benefits in a variety of applications. These can range from present day niche applications such as antenna remoting at satellite earth stations, to future mainstream applications such as a cordless or mobile periphery to an optical fibre network infrastructure. Future communication expectations are very likely to revolve around cordlessness or mobility while, in the same timeframe, major network operators are expected to expand their optical fibre infrastructure more and more into the access network. RoF systems provide good synergy between optics and radio, and are ideally placed, therefore, to allow an efficient means for these two seemingly disparate technologies to merge. This chapter sets out to cover some of the recent developments towards realising RoF systems operating at millimetre-wave frequencies, where the spectral resource that these future applications are likely to require can be obtained.

Inspec keywords: optoelectronic devices; radio-over-fibre; optical fibre networks

Other keywords: telecommunication networks; optoelectronics; RoF transmission systems; free-space radio; millimetre-wave radio over fibre systems; optical fibre network

Subjects: Optical fibre networks