Intelligent optical performance monitor using multi-task learning based artificial neural network

An intelligent optical performance monitor using multi-task learning based artificial neural network (MTL-ANN) is designed for simultaneous OSNR monitoring and modulation format identification (MFI). Signals' amplitude histograms (AHs) after constant module algorithm are selected as the input features for MTL-ANN. The results obtained from simulation and experiment of NRZ-OOK, PAM4 and PAM8 signals demonstrate that MTL-ANN could achieve OSNR monitoring and MFI simultaneously with higher accuracy and stability compared with single-task learning based ANNs (STL-ANNs). The results show an MFI accuracy of 100% for the three modulation formats under consideration. Furthermore, OSNR monitoring with mean-square error (MSE) of 0.12 dB and accuracy of 100% is achieved while regarding it as regression problem and classification problem, respectively. In this intelligent optical performance monitor, only a single MTL-ANN is deployed, which enables reduced-complexity optical performance monitor (OPM) devices for multi-parameters estimation in future heterogeneous optical network. (C) 2019 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement