Abstract
In this paper, we report a simulation study on the performance enhancement of Praseodymium doped silica fiber amplifiers (PDFAs) in O-band (1270-1350 nm) in terms of small signal gain, power conversion efficiency (PCE), and output optical power by employing bidirectional pumping. The PDFA performance is examined by optimizing the length of Praseodymium doped silica fiber (PDF), its mode-field diameter (MFD) and the concentration of Pr3+. A small-signal peak gain of 56.4 dB, power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 47%, and output optical power of around 1.6 W (32 dBm) is observed at optimized parameters for input signal wavelength of 1310 nm. Minimum noise figure (NF) of 4.1 dB is observed at input signal wavelength of 1310 nm. Moreover, the effect of varying the pump wavelength and pump power on output optical power of the amplifier and amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) noise is also investigated, respectively. Finally, the impact of ion-ion interaction (up-conversion effect) on small-signal gain of the amplifier is also studied by considering different values of up-conversion coefficient.