Abstract
We propose a passive optical network for customer access based on a hybrid coherence multiplexing/coarse wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) technique. Coherence multiplexing provides asynchronous multichannel transmission, and coarse WDM provides bidirectional transmission. A costshared superfluorescent source is used for downstream transmission, and inexpensive light-emitting diodes are employed for upstream transmission. Asynchronous two channel transmission at 40 Mb/s per channel is demonstrated for both upstream and downstream. Our experiment indicates that upstream and downstream aggregate bit rates of 640 Mb/s are feasible based on current commercially available components.