The sixth generation of mobile communication (6G) systems is recently rising a lot of interest, introducing new futuristic and challenging use cases that will demand much more than just communications to become a reality. Higher throughput, lower latencies, higher number of connections will push the requirement of the future mobile networks to a new level, but also sensing, positioning and imaging will play an important role in the new foreseen use cases. The integration of techniques developed for wireless communications with those conceived for optical links will be essential to provide the infrastructure for the 6G networks. In this context, this paper presents a review on wireless and optical convergent access solutions towards the 6G systems. The manuscript brings the use cases, requirements and enablers for 6G networks including a discussion about the state-of-the-art on THz and sub-THz communications, wireless and optical convergence, visible light communication, integrated and free-space optics, new antenna designs, power-over-fiber deployments and the use of machine learning in the physical layer of future networks. By reviewing the most relevant contributions available in the literature for wireless and optical communications and presenting their main contributions, this paper clearly shows that, more than a technological trend, the convergence of wireless and optical technologies is a fundamental step towards the development of the 6G network infrastructure.

The use of microwave high-electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) as photodetectors or optically controlled circuit elements have attracted interest. A model of the optical characteristics of HEMTs, which takes into account carrier transport as well as the quantum mechanical nature of the two-dimensional (2-D) electron gas channel, is presented. It is shown that the effect of illumination is equivalent to a shift in the gate to source bias voltage, referred to as the internal photovoltaic effect. The theoretical model is supported by experimental results that demonstrate that the HEMT photoresponse is a nonlinear function of light intensity with very high responsivity at low optical power levels.

Double-pass (DP) and single-pass (SP) erbium-doped depressed cladding fiber amplifiers designed for S-band operation are evaluated under changes of the input optical power, pumping power, and fiber bending radius. The DP configuration employs the usual combination of a circulator and a Faraday rotator mirror while the SP is based on the copropagating scheme. The amplifiers were characterized in terms of gain and noise figure. It is demonstrated that the DP topology shows much improved gain performance compared to the SP configuration although the noise figure is slightly degraded by counterpropagating amplified spontaneous emission.

We report on a temperature sensor based on the monitoring of the luminescence spectrum of CdSe/ZnS nanocrystals, dispersed in mineral oil and inserted into the core of a photonic crystal fiber. The high overlap between the pump light and the nanocrystals as well as the luminescence guiding provided by the fiber geometry resulted in relatively high luminescence powers and improved optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR). Also, both core end interfaces were sealed so as to generate a more stable and robust waveguide structure. Temperature sensitivity experiments indicated a 70 pm/°C spectral shift over the 5°C to 90°C range.

This paper carries out a rigorous analysis of supercontinuum generation in an improved highly asymmetric microstructured fiber (MF) design. This geometry, defined simply as D-MF, has the advantage of being produced with a regular stacking and drawing technology. We have obtained birefringence values on the order of 4.87×10^-3 at the adopted pump wavelength and a significantly smaller effective area when compared to a whole MF, which makes this fiber quite attractive for SCG. Therefore, this D-MF design is a promising alternative for SCG since it provides new degrees of freedom to control field confinement, birefringence, and dispersion characteristics of MFs.