IEC TR 61292-3:2020

IEC TR 61292-3 ®
Edition 2.0 2020-03
TECHNICAL
REPORT
colour
inside
Optical amplifiers –
Part 3: Classification, characteristics and applications
All rights reserved. Unless otherwise specified, no part of this publication may be reproduced or utilized in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and microfilm, without permission in writing from
either IEC or IEC's member National Committee in the country of the requester. If you have any questions about IEC
copyright or have an enquiry about obtaining additional rights to this publication, please contact the address below or
your local IEC member National Committee for further information.

IEC Central Office Tel.: +41 22 919 02 11
3, rue de Varembé info@iec.ch
CH-1211 Geneva 20 www.iec.ch
Switzerland
About the IEC
The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) is the leading global organization that prepares and publishes
International Standards for all electrical, electronic and related technologies.

About IEC publications
The technical content of IEC publications is kept under constant review by the IEC. Please make sure that you have the
latest edition, a corrigendum or an amendment might have been published.

IEC publications search - webstore.iec.ch/advsearchform Electropedia - www.electropedia.org
The advanced search enables to find IEC publications by a The world's leading online dictionary on electrotechnology,
variety of criteria (reference number, text, technical containing more than 22 000 terminological entries in English
committee,…). It also gives information on projects, replaced and French, with equivalent terms in 16 additional languages.
and withdrawn publications. Also known as the International Electrotechnical Vocabulary

(IEV) online.
IEC Just Published - webstore.iec.ch/justpublished
Stay up to date on all new IEC publications. Just Published IEC Glossary - std.iec.ch/glossary
details all new publications released. Available online and once 67 000 electrotechnical terminology entries in English and
a month by email. French extracted from the Terms and Definitions clause of IEC
publications issued since 2002. Some entries have been
IEC Customer Service Centre - webstore.iec.ch/csc collected from earlier publications of IEC TC 37, 77, 86 and
If you wish to give us your feedback on this publication or need CISPR.

further assistance, please contact the Customer Service

Centre: sales@iec.ch.
IEC TR 61292-3 ®
Edition 2.0 2020-03
TECHNICAL
REPORT
colour
inside
Optical amplifiers –
Part 3: Classification, characteristics and applications

INTERNATIONAL
ELECTROTECHNICAL
COMMISSION
ICS 33.160.10; 33.180.30 ISBN 978-2-8322-8014-0

– 2 – IEC TR 61292-3:2020 © IEC:2020
CONTENTS
FOREWORD . 4
1 Scope . 6
2 Normative references . 6
3 Terms, definitions and abbreviated terms . 6
3.1 Terms and definitions . 6
3.2 Abbreviated terms . 7
4 Classification . 8
4.1 Types of OA . 8
4.2 Amplification forms . 10
4.2.1 Lumped (or discrete) amplification and distributed amplification . 10
4.2.2 Single channel and multichannel amplification . 10
4.2.3 Fixed and variable gain amplification . 10
4.3 Application of optical amplifiers . 11
5 General properties, performance and configurations . 12
5.1 Erbium-doped fibre amplifiers (EDFAs) . 12
5.1.1 General properties . 12
5.1.2 Typical performance . 13
5.1.3 Configurations . 14
5.1.4 Control scheme . 16
5.1.5 Product configurations and application . 17
5.2 Fibre Raman amplifiers (FRAs) . 18
5.2.1 General properties . 18
5.2.2 Typical performance . 19
5.2.3 Configuration . 20
5.2.4 Control scheme . 20
5.2.5 Product configurations and application . 20
5.3 Semiconductor amplifiers (SOAs). 20
5.3.1 General properties . 20
5.3.2 Typical performance . 21
5.3.3 Configurations . 21
5.3.4 Product configurations and applications . 22
Annex A (informative) Other rare earth-doped fibre amplifiers . 23
A.1 General . 23
A.2 Praseodymium-doped fibre amplifier (PDFA) . 23
A.3 Thulium-doped fibre amplifier (TDFA) . 24
Annex B (informative) SDM amplifiers . 26
Bibliography . 27

Figure 1 – Classification of optical amplifiers . 9
Figure 2 – Amplification bandwidth of each type of amplifier . 10
Figure 3 – Application forms of optical amplifiers in an optical transmission system . 11
Figure 4 – Application forms of optical amplifiers in optical network (ROADM with
colourless, directionless and contention-less function and arrayed amplifier) . 12
Figure 5 – Abridged and primary energy levels for erbium ion . 13
Figure 6 – Pumping configurations of optical fibre amplifier . 14

Figure 7 – Core and cladding pumping configurations . 15
Figure 8 – Configuration of ROPA . 15
Figure 9 – Single stage and double stage configurations . 16
Figure 10 – Control schemes of EDFA . 17
Figure 11 – Product configurations . 18
Figure A.1 – Abridged and primary energy levels for praseodymium ion . 23
Figure A.2 – Abridged and primary energy levels for thulium ion . 25
Figure B.1 – Space division multiplexing amplifiers . 26

– 4 – IEC TR 61292-3:2020 © IEC:2020
INTERNATIONAL ELECTROTECHNICAL COMMISSION
____________
OPTICAL AMPLIFIERS –
Part 3: Classification, characteristics and applications

FOREWORD
1) The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) is a worldwide organization for standardization comprising
all national electrotechnical committees (IEC National Committees). The object of IEC is to promote international
co-operation on all questions concerning standardization in the electrical and electronic fields. To this end and
in addition to other activities, IEC publishes International Standards, Technical Specifications, Technical Reports,
Publicly Available Specifications (PAS) and Guides (hereafter referred to as "IEC Publication(s)"). Their
preparation is entrusted to technical committees; any IEC National Committee interested in the subject dealt with
may participate in this preparatory work. International, governmental and non-governmental organizations liaising
with the IEC also participate in this preparation. IEC collaborates closely with the International Organization for
Standardization (ISO) in accordance with conditions determined by agreement between the two organizations.
2) The formal decisions or agreements of IEC on technical matters express, as nearly as possible, an international
consensus of opinion on the relevant subjects since each technical committee has representation from all
interested IEC National Committees.
3) IEC Publications have the form of recommendations for international use and are accepted by IEC National
Committees in that sense. While all reasonable efforts are made to ensure that the technical content of IEC
Publications is accurate, IEC cannot be held responsible for the way in which they are used or for any
misinterpretation by any end user.
4) In order to promote international uniformity, IEC National Committees undertake to apply IEC Publications
transparently to the maximum extent possible in their national and regional publications. Any divergence between
any IEC Publication and the corresponding national or regional publication shall be clearly indicated in the latter.
5) IEC itself does not provide any attestation of conformity. Independent certification bodies provide conformity
assessment services and, in some areas, access to IEC marks of conformity. IEC is not responsible for any
services carried out by independent certification bodies.
6) All users should ensure that they have the latest edition of this publication.
7) No liability shall attach to IEC or its directors, employees, servants or agents including individual experts and
members of its technical committees and IEC National Committees for any personal injury, property damage or
other damage of any nature whatsoever, whether direct or indirect, or for costs (including legal fees) and
expenses arising out of the publication, use of, or reliance upon, this IEC Publication or any other IEC Publications.
8) Attention is drawn to the Normative references cited in this publication. Use of the referenced publications is
indispensable for the correct application of this publication.
9) Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this IEC Publication may be the subject of patent
rights. IEC shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights.
The main task of IEC technical committees is to prepare International Standards. However, a
technical committee may propose the publication of a Technical Report when it has collected
data of a different kind from that which is normally published as an International Standard, for
example "state of the art".
IEC TR 61292-3, which is a technical report, has been prepared by subcommittee 86C: Fibre
optic systems and active devices, of IEC technical committee 86: Fibre optics.
This second edition cancels and replaces the first edition published in 2003. This edition
constitutes a technical revision.
This edition includes the following significant technical changes with respect to the previous
edition:
a) document architecture now focuses on EDFA, FRA and SOA;
b) the description of PDFA and TDFA has been moved to the annexes;
c) the EDWA description has been deleted;

d) information on single channel amplification, multi-channel amplification, configuration and
control method for EDFA, FRA and SOA has been added;
e) information on future amplifiers, arrayed amplifiers and SDM amplifiers has been added.
The text of this document is based on the following documents:
Draft TR Report on voting
86C/1597/DTR 86C/1630/RVDTR
Full information on the voting for the approval of this document can be found in the report on
voting indicated in the above table.
This document has been drafted in accordance with the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2.
A list of all parts in the IEC 61292 series, published under the general title Optical amplifiers,
can be found on the IEC website.
The committee has decided that the contents of this document will remain unchanged until the
stability date indicated on the IEC website under "http://webstore.iec.ch" in the data related to
the specific document. At this date, the docume
...