SOP and PMD monitoring on deployed aerial optical fibres

State of polarization (SOP) and polarization mode dispersion (PMD) are stochastic in nature due to changes in the properties of the optical fibres and its positions because of both intrinsic and extrinsic perturbations. With 184 PMD values obtained by use of the FTB-5700 single-ended dispersion analyzer, the predicted theoretical Gaussian fit was obtained with a mean of 0.47 ps and standard deviation of 0.08 ps. This small standard deviation was justification for its accuracy in measuring PMD of aerial optical fibres. A comparison is also made on the accuracy of the GINTY and the FTB-5700 on measurement of PMD of aerial optical fibres with results showing that the latter is more accurate compared to the former. The time scale over which to compensate PMD in aerial optical fibres was determined and it is slightly higher than 400 s; the decorrelation time obtained for SOPs on a particular windy and hot day. This is because the changes of the PMD vector are known to be slower than SOP changes.