We present a novel continuous-time microwave photonic link that translates eight contiguous folding bandwidths (FBW) to a single intermediate frequency (IF) bandwidth, with real-time discrimination of signals that are imaged or folded upon one another. A remote phase modulator imparts the source bandwidth of interest (BOI) onto the optical carrier, and one modulator of a dual-parallel Mach-Zehnder modulator (DPMZM) at the receiver imparts two local oscillator (LO) tones in parallel with the BOI. Third-order intermodulation distortion (IMD) between the LOs generates two more LOs, giving four LOs with eight FBWs downconverting to the IF band. A Hartley-type image rejection scheme discriminates between the upper and lower sideband images around each LO. Analysis shows the effects of different bias combinations or errors upon image rejection. Experimental results show up to at least 35dB of folded image rejection across 4GHz of original spectrum and the system successfully demodulated 64QAM signals, with almost no degradation, in the presence of a folded-image interferer.

中文翻译：

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具有带间图像抑制的带折叠微波光子链路

我们提出了一种新颖的连续时间微波光子链路，可将八个连续折叠带宽 (FBW) 转换为单个中频 (IF) 带宽，并实时区分成像或折叠在一起的信号。远程相位调制器将感兴趣的源带宽 (BOI) 赋予光载波，接收器处的双并行马赫-曾德调制器 (DPMZM) 的一个调制器赋予两个与 BOI 并行的本地振荡器 (LO) 音调。LO 之间的三阶互调失真 (IMD) 会生成另外两个 LO，从而提供四个 LO，其中 8 个 FBW 下变频到 IF 频段。Hartley 型镜像抑制方案区分每个 LO 周围的上边带和下边带镜像。分析显示了不同偏置组合或误差对镜像抑制的影响。