Graded-index multimode fibre is used for the delay lines since

the multimode 1 x 7 optical splitter and the 7 x 1 optical

combiner are readily available.
A data bit T is continuously sent by stations 1 to 14 in
arbitrary time slots by suitable delaying the clock as shown in
Fig. 2. Data are sent by a 15th station in the 33rd slot (also
chosen arbitrarily) using a Ti:LiNbO 3 Mach-Zehnder type
interferometric integrated electro-optic modulator, which
requires polarised input light. A fibre polarisation controller5
is used to adjust the input polarisation state. The polarisation
controller introduces a loss of <0-5dB and the modulator
introduces a loss of 7 dB.
The fused biconical multimode star coupler combines the
signals from the 15 stations. An optical receiver retrieves the
data by delaying the clock to the 33rd slot and adding it to
the TDMA signal, using a multimode 2 x 2 coupler. Fig. 3
shows the oscilloscope traces of the clock, the TDMA frame
with the clock pedestal, and the recovered data. The clock
amplitude is set equal to the signal amplitude.

Conclusion: A fixed assignment TDMA fibre-optic system

with 50 assignable time slots and optical synchronisation was
implemented at lOMbit/s (2ns slots), and <10" 9 BER was
measured. The feasibility of the protocol was demonstrated
with 15 active stations (14 interferers and pseudorandom
data). In the future, the Lightwave Communications Laboratory at Columbia University will incorporate a mode-locked
Nd:YAG laser in the TDMA network, generating 140 ps
pulses at 1-32/mi with peak pulse powers of 150 W. This will
allow up to 500 active stations transmitting at 14Mbit/s.
Nonlinear optical effects may be avoided by coupling the laser
light directly into a bundle offibres.The data regeneration
process will also be done optically, using optical bistable
devices, to reduce the electronic bandwidth requirement of the
receiver.
Acknowledgments: The authors wish to thank Dr. M. Corke of
Amphenol Fibre Optics Products and L. W. Stulz of AT&T
Bell Laboratories for providing some optical components. The
assistance of D. J. Blumenthal and M. Levy of the Lightwave
Communications Laboratory is also acknowledged.
P. R. PRUCNAL
M. A. SANTORO
S. K. SEHGAL
Lightwave Communications Laboratory
Center for Telecommunications Research
Columbia University
New York, NY 10027, USA

16th September 1986

I. P. KAMINOW
AT&T Bell Laboratories
Crawford Hill Laboratory
Holmdel, NJ 07733, USA
Fig. 3
a Optical clock synchronised to 33rd slot with 2 ns pulses at
10 MHz
b TDMA frame sequence at photodetector output showing 14
interfering ones and data sequence in 33rd slot. Ones in slot 33 are
raised on the clock pedestal, whereas zeros in slot 33 do not appear
on the clock pedestal
c Recovered data (one is low, zero is high) at monostable multivibrator output 10101000100011101010

A lOMbit/s pseudorandom word pattern is generated by a

bit-error-rate (BER) test set and transmitted in the 33rd time
slot. BERs better than 10" 9 are measured, verifying that,
given this laser pulse energy, excess optical loss and receiver
sensitivity, 15 stations can indeed be accommodated in the
TDMA system. With an increase in laser pulse energy, the
number of stations can be increased in accordance with
eqn. 1.

TAYLOR SERIES APPROACH TO

FUNCTIONAL APPROXIMATION FOR
INVERSION OF LAPLACE TRANSFORMS
Indexing terms: Control theory, Laplace transforms, Taylor
series, Inverse Laplace transforms
The letter is devoted to a functional approximation for inversion of the Laplace transform. The function is approximated
by a truncated Taylor series, which is expanded about t 0 = 0.
Utilising a special transformation, each Laplace transform is
converted into a set of simultaneous linear algebraic equations which are then easily computed to give the coefficients
of the basis function. Two examples with satisfactory results
are given.

Introduction: As is well known, the Laplace transform method

has found wide applications in many engineering problems.
However, it is sometimes very difficult to obtain inversion of
the Laplace transform. It is not a trivial matter, particularly
for transcendental functions whose inversions are not given in
tables of Laplace transforms.
In the past, the inversion of Laplace transforms via orthogonal functions has been discussed by many researchers. Chen
et al.1 first considered fractional calculus for inverting irratio-

References
1

DA VIES, P. W., BARBER, D. L. A., PRICE, W. L., a n d SOLOMONIDES, C. M.:

'Computer networks and protocols' (John Wiley & Sons, New

York, 1981), Chap. 5
2

PRUCNAL, p. R., SANTORO, M. A., and FAN, T. R.: 'Spread spectrum

fiber optic local area network using optical processing', J. Lightwave Technoi, 1986, 4, pp. 547-554
3

PRUCNAL, P. R., SANTORO, M. A., and SEHGAL, s. K.: 'Ultra-fast all-

optical synchronous multiple access fiber networks', J. Lightwave

Technoi. and IEEE J. Sel. Areas in Commun. (joint special issue),
to be published
4

GOTO, H., NAGASH1MA, K., SUZUKI, S., KONDO, M., a n d OHTA, Y.:

'Optical time-division digital switching: an experiment'. OS A/

IEEE sixth topical meeting on optical fiber communications, New
Orleans, 28 Feb.-l March 1983
5 LEFEVRE, H. c.: 'Single-mode-fibre fractional-wave devices and polarisation controllers', Electron. Lett., 1980,16, p. 778

nal Laplace transforms using Walsh functions, and its related

block pulse functions have been extensively applied to the
inversion of rational and irrational Laplace transforms.2"4
Instead, their results are piecewise constant. More recently,
the application of shifted Chebyshev series5 has been studied
from piecewise constant orthogonal functions to continuous
orthogonal polynomials. However, it needs more computation
time to calculate the coefficients of a basis function through
using recursive forms. The objective of this letter is to obtain a
more effective and simple procedure for inverting rational and
transcendental Laplace transforms via the Taylor series
approach. As Bellman et al.6 have pointed out, no completely
general and satisfactory numerical inversion formula exists for
the Laplace transform; consequently, different numerical techniques should be studied for the purpose of solving particular
classes of common control problems. It is this idea that has
motivated the work introduced herein. Two numerical examples are given to show the effectiveness of the present method.
Taylor polynomials: A function y = y(t) which is analytic in
the neighbourhood of the point 10 = 0 may be expanded into
a power series using the Maclaurin formula

ELECTRONICS LETTERS 6th November 1986 Vol. 22 No. 23

(i)
n= 0

1219

where

where a( are coefficients to be determined. Next, multiplying

eqn. 10 by fj{t) exp ( t/k) and integrating from 0 to oo gives

'*>-

'-h&

(2)
y(t)fft)exp(-t/k)dt

With the view of obtaining an approximate expression of the

analytic function y(t) over the interval (0, T), where y(t) may
be assumed analytic, one can truncate the series of eqn. 1 up
to the mth term:

00

m-1

= I , fi

exp (-t/k) dt

;=o J
(3)

j = 0,l,2,...,m-l

(11)

Invoking eqn. 9, eqn. 11 can be rewritten as

or

00

y(t) ~ aTJ[t)

(4)

,0 %<*. = fJj

(12)

where
<xT = [ a 0 , a l s . . . , a m _ j "

By the definition of the Laplace transform, a function y(t) is

given as

and

fT(t) = IMtlUt),....

/_,()] = [i, t, t\ ..., r - 1 ]

y(t) exp (-st) dt = Y(s)

Here, f(t) is the called basis function vector. In general, the

function basis is written as

(13)

Letting; = 0,1,2,..., one has

y(t)exp(-t/k)fo(t)dt=Y(l/k)
(5)
y(t)txv(-t/k)fl(t)dt=Y(2/k)
At this point, integrating ft{z)fj(z) from z = 0 to z = 1, one
obtains

(14)
y(t)txp(-t/k)f2(t)dt=Y(3/k)

^fi(z)fJ{z)dz = - ~ ^

(6)

In an effort to invert the Laplace transforms, the domain has

to be transformed into values between 0 and infinity. Let
z = exp ( t/k)

0 < t < oo

(7)

where k is an adjustable positive parameter; for convenience,

k = 1 is selected for implementation. Therefore, the basis function becomes

cxp(-t/k)

exp(-2t/k)

Then, eqns. 12 and 14 form a set of m simultaneous linear

algebraic equations which are used to calculate <x0, al5 . . . ,
a m _j. Once the af have been determined, the functional
approximation for the inverse Laplace transform can be
obtained from eqn. 10.
Numerical examples:
(a) Example 1: Consider the following rational transfer function:

fo(t) = 1
=

y(t)txp(-t/k)fJ{t)dt=Y(j+l/k)

(8)

Y(s) = A/s(s + 2)
From eqns. 12 and 14, one constructs a set of simultaneous
linear algebraic equations for m = 3 and k = 1:

from which it is seen that the constant k has the function of

regulating the response speed.
Inserting eqn. 7 into eqn. 6, one obtains a useful formula for
inverting Laplace transforms as

a, + (l/3)a2 = 4/3
(l/2)a0 + (1/3)01! + (l/4)a2 = 1/2
(15)

00

(9)

By the solution of eqn. 15, one obtains a0, al5 a2 as

a0 = 2

Obtaining inverse Laplace transforms: Any finite function y(t)

can be represented by a series expansion. In this method, the
function is denoted as a Taylor polynomial:

at = 0

a2 = - 2

Therefore the inverse Laplace transform of Y(s) is

y(t) = 2 2 exp ( 20

(10)

1220

This is precisely the same as the exact solution of y(t).

ELECTRONICS LETTERS 6th November 1986

Vol. 22 No. 23

Introduction: Exact analysis of fused couplers is a formidable

task since it requires the exact solution of the 2-D vector wave
equation. Therefore, many discussions on fused couplers are
limited to those of rectangular cross-section, for which
approximate analytical results are available.1"3 Recently,
Snyder and Zheng, making use of their asymptotic solution
for the Maxwell equations,4 have derived very simple expressions for fused couplers of various cross-sectional shapes.5
However, the accuracy of their results5 at finite V has not
been confirmed since they are exact only at infinite V, where
V is the normalised frequency. Moreover, the derivation of
such formulas requires the solution of the 2-D scalar wave
equation in an arbitrarily bounded domain and the computation of the normal derivative of the scalar field on the boundary. These calculations are in general quite cumbersome.6
In this letter the effective-index method, which was developed for the analysis of optical waveguides of general crosssection,7"9 is applied to the analysis of fused couplers. The
method is very simple and highly efficient. Results for rectangular and elliptical couplers are compared with those given
by the asymptotic analysis.4-5 A stadium-shaped coupler,
which models the realistic one, is also analysed by the present
method.

(b) Example 2: Consider the following problem, whose transcendental transfer function1 is given as

Y(s) = (l/s)exp(-s/s+l)
Likewise, taking m = 3 and k = 1, the coefficients are found
by using eqns. 12 and 14 as
a o = 0-9211

a t = 0-768

a 2 = 0-21

Consequently, y{t) is obtained as

y(t) = 0-9211 - 0-768 exp ( - f ) + 0-21 exp (-2t)
For comparison, the exact solution, the Chebyshev approach
and the proposed method are shown in Table 1. The agreement is quite satisfactory.
Table 1 COMPARISON OF SOLUTIONS
FOR EXAMPLE 2
t

Exact

Taylor

Chebyshev
(Chou et al.5)

00
0-4
0-8
1-2
1-6
20

0-3678
0-5009
0-6086
0-6948
0-7633
0-8172

0-3631
0-5007
0-6184
0-7089
0-7746
0-8210

0-3828
0-4937
0-6083
0-7032
0-7749
0-8267

Method: A coupler is characterised by the polarisationdependent coupling coefficients Cx = (/Ju /?2i)/2 and Cy =
(fii - 0$i)A 2 ' 5 where ftx (flO and F2l (0>2l) are the propagation constants for the E\i (Eyu) and 21 (21) modes of the
coupler, respectively. Here, modes are designated according to
Goell's method.10 Since a typical fused coupler is operated at
V P I,2 the mode field in the coupler is approximately uniformly polarised.4 This consideration makes it possible to use
the effective-index method7"9 to accurately determine the propagation constants and hence the coupling coefficients of the
coupler, which can be of arbitrary shape.
The basic principle of the effective-index method is to
reduce, approximately, the 2-D wave equation into 1-D wave
equations which can be solved easily.7"9 We consider a fused
coupler with long axis 2a and short axis 2b as shown in
Fig. la. At x = x,, the thickness of the coupler is given by
2t(xi). The propagation constant for the TEn_x
(JMn_^)
mode of the infinite slab of thickness 2t(x), with index nx
sandwiched between two semi-infinite layers of index n2, is
used to define the effective-index function nx(x). The propagation constant for the TMm-x (TE^i) mode of the infinite
slab of thickness 2a, with index profile nx(x), is then the
approximate propagation constant for the * (^) mode of
the coupler. In many cases, nx(x) being analytically determined
from t(x),7-8 we need to analyse only one inhomogeneous slab
to obtain the solution for the 2-D structure. The coupling

Conclusion: The Taylor series approach to the inverse Laplace

transforms for rational and transcendental transfer functions
has been considered. The significant advantage is that each
transfer function is converted into a set of simultaneous linear
algebraic equations. This method is simple and very amenable
to computer programming. The results show that the agreement is excellent.
HUANG-YUAN CHUNG
YORK-YIH SUN*
Department of Mechanical Engineering
* Department of Electrical Engineering
National Cheng Kung University
Tainan, Taiwan, Republic of China

16th September 1986

References
1

CHEN, c. F., TSAY, Y. T., and wu, T. T.: 'Walsh operational matrices
for fractional calculus and their application to distributed systems',
J. Franklin Inst., 1977, 303, pp. 267-284

SHIEH, L. s., YATES, R. E., and NAVARRO, J. M.: 'Solving inverse

Laplace transform, linear and nonlinear state equations using

block-pulse functions', Comput. & Electr. Eng., 1979, 6, pp. 3-17
3 WANG, c. H.: 'Generalized block-pulse operational matrices and
their applications to operational calculus', Int. J. Control., 1982,
36, pp. 67-76
4 WANG, c. H.: 'On the generalization of block pulse operational
matrices for fractional and operational calculus', J. Franklin Inst.,
1983,315, pp. 91-102
5

CHOU, J. H., and HORNG, I. R.: 'On a functional approximation for

inversion of Laplace transforms via shifted Chebyshev series', Int.

J. Systems Sci., 1986,17, pp. 735-739
6 BELLMAN, R., KALABA, R., and LOCKETT, J.: 'Numerical inversion of
the Laplace transform' (American Elsevier, New York, 1966),
Chap. 2

ANALYSIS OF FUSED COUPLERS BY THE

EFFECTIVE-INDEX METHOD
y.
Indexing terms: Optical fibres, Optical couplers
Fused couplers of various cross-sections are analysed by the
effective-index method. Results show good agreement with
those given by an asymptotic analysis. It is also shown that a
stadium-shaped coupler which resembles the realistic one has
the polarisation beam-splitting property similar to that of a
rectangular one.

ELECTRONICS LETTERS 6th November 1986

Vol. 22

1319/11

Fig. 1 Fused coupler approximately modelled by a planar waveguide

with refractive-index profile (a) njjc) or (b) ny(y)

No. 23

1221