A Direct Learning Approach for Neural Network Based Pre-Distortion for Coherent Nonlinear Optical Transmitter

High throughput coherent optical transmitters are key components in future optical communication infrastructure. However, these transmitters are often distorted with the non-linearity of their components. A potential approach for compensating nonlinearity is by applying digital pre-distortion methods based on the Volterra series or one of its derivatives. However, the Volterra series-based solution is complex to implement, difficult to scale, and its simplified versions may not yield the desired performance. Recently digital pre distortion solutions based on neural networks were proposed, which may benefit from the generality of neural networks and can be more easily scaled. These solutions are often based on non-standard neural network architectures which require complex neurons-based architectures or being based on indirect training approach which suffer from noise enhancement. In this article, a novel method for neural network-based pre-distortion with direct learning is proposed. The direct learning with neural network does not assume a specific transmitter model and does not suffer from noise enhancement. The method assumes standard neural network inference architecture and is applied to a coherent nonlinear optical transmitted with long-short-term memory neural network. The overall performance and complexity of the direct learning method is compared with the indirect approach and with the Volterra series-based solution, showing significant advantage in performance, especially in cases of severe nonlinearity and noise conditions.