Distributing Microwave Signals via Polymer Optical Fiber (POF) Systems Anthony Ng’oma, Ton Koonen, Idelfonso Tafur Monroy, Henrie van den Boom, Peter Smulders, Giok-Djan Khoe COBRA Research Institute, Eindhoven University of Technology, P.O. Box 513, NL 5600 MB Eindhoven, The Netherlands (e-mail: a.ngoma@tue.nl) A technique to distribute GHz microwave signals via Graded Index Polymer Optical Fiber (GIPOF) is proposed. The method employs fast sweeping of the optical frequency at the headend and a periodic filter at the remote station, where high frequency microwave signals are generated and fed into antennas. The sweeping rate of the optical frequency is kept within the modal dispersion-limited bandwidth of GIPOF. Simulation results with and without data modulation show this to be a promising technique with possible application in distributing wireless LAN signals. GIPOF offers lower installation and maintenance costs than silica fiber and yet higher performance than copper cables. Introduction There is a general demand driven trend towards broadband services on mobile (wireless) communication networks. This is evident from new communication networks such as Universal Mobile Telecommunication Systems (UMTS) offering up to 2 Mbps, wireless LANs (WLAN) offering up to 54 Mbps and other third generation systems such as the Mobile Broadband Systems/Services (MBS) to offer 150 Mbps B-ISDN data rates. However, increasing capacity entails increasing carrier frequencies. For instance WLAN carriers for 11Mbps per carrier systems (IEEE802.11b) operate in the 2 GHz band, while the IEEE802.11a offering 54Mbps per carrier operates in the 5 GHz band. The MBS will need millimeter wave (60 GHz) carriers. As the frequencies go up, radio cells become smaller (micro- and pico-cells) enabling more efficient spectrum utilization. However, this leads to more complex systems requiring numerous access points to achieve the required coverage. Optical techniques have emerged as cost effective means of distributing GHz microwaves because they lead to simplified remote stations (RS) and enhance sharing of expensive switching and modulation equipment located in the central station (CS) [1]. Many radio over fiber (RoF) techniques using the high bandwidth standard single mode fiber (SMF) have been developed and demonstrated [1]-[5]. However, these methods are not suitable for GIPOF due to modal dispersion, which limits its bandwidth. Nevertheless, GIPOF is emerging as a more attractive fiber for business and residential environments because its large core and flexibility make it easy to handle leading to lower system installation and maintenance costs. State-of-the-art GIPOFs offer 1 GHz- km bandwidth products and 10dB/km attenuation [6] [7] [8]. We propose a novel technique, which overcomes capacity limitations in GIPOF links to generate high frequency microwaves at the remote station as well as perform data modulation. The technique relies on optical frequency multiplication.