Rate and Power Scaling of Space-Division Multiplexing Via Nonlinear Perturbation

A nonlinear perturbation model for fiber-optic channels is used to analyze achievable rates of combined space-division multiplexing (SDM) and wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM). The analysis shows that, for a large number S of SDM channels, the power of the nonlinear interference is at most quadratic in S. The achievable rates scale at least as the cubic root of S and linearly with the optimized launch power for large S. The expressions are verified numerically for systems with up to 16 SDM channels and 5 WDM channels.