The accuracy assessment of different polarization mode dispersion models

Several polarization mode dispersion (PMD) models were developed to help understanding PMD effects and simplify the analysis regarding their impact on the system performance. Whether or not a PMD model can be used to accurately predict the system impairments depends on how well it approximates fiber PMD. In this paper, we assess the accuracy of six commonly used first- and second-order PMD models by comparing them with an all-order PMD model. Both PMD induced pulse broadening and optical-signal-to-noise-ratio (OSNR) penalties are determined, analyzed, and compared for each PMD model. To separate first- and higher-order PMD effects, we investigate the system performance with and without PMD compensation. We find that, compared with the all-order PMD model, all the known first- and second-order PMD models overestimate the PMD distortions, and the PMD models that do not contain higher than second-order PMD generate the largest deviation. Our results show that the first-order PMD model can be used to approximate the all-order PMD model when no PMD compensation is used, but none of the known PMD models can generate results close enough to those of the all-order PMD model for a PMD compensated system. This indicates that to accurately evaluate the performance of PMD mitigation techniques, the all-order PMD model has to be used.