Fiber Optics
Fedor Mitschke
Fiber Optics
Physics and Technology
123
Prof. Dr. Fedor Mitschke
Universit¨at Rostock
Institut f¨ur Physik
Universit¨atsplatz 3
18055 Rostock
Germany
fedor.mitschke@uni-rostock.de
ISBN 978-3-642-03702-3
DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-03703-0
Springer Heidelberg Dordrecht London New York
e-ISBN 978-3-642-03703-0
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Absent a Telephone,
a Bicyclist Had to Save
the World
On the height of the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, no direct telecommunication
line existed between the White House and the Kremlin. All messages going
back and forth had to be sent through intermediaries. The world teetered on
the brink of nuclear Armageddon when in the evening of October 23 President
John F. Kennedy sent his brother, Robert Kennedy, over to the Soviet Embassy
for a last-ditch effort to resolve the crisis peacefully. Robert presented a proposal
how both sides could stand down without losing face. Right after the meeting,
Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin hastened to write a report to Nikita Khrushchev
in Moscow. A bicycle courier was called in to take this letter to a Western Union
telegraph station, and Dobrynin personally instructed him to go straight to the
station because the message was important – which was hardly an exaggeration.
That man on the bicycle, in my view, has saved the world. Most likely,
without even knowing.
A year later, a direct telegraph line was installed which was popularly called
the “red telephone.” (There never was an actual red telephone sitting in the
Oval Office.) A lesson had been learned: Communication can be vital when it
comes to solving conflicts.
Today the situation is vastly different from what it was less than half a cen-
tury ago. The world is knit together by a network of connections of economic,
political, cultural, and other nature. That is only possible because virtually
instantaneous long-distance communication at affordable cost has become ubiq-
uitous. In earlier centuries, important news – like the outcome of a battle, say –
often was received only several weeks later. Today we are not the least bit as-
tonished when we watch unfolding events in the remotest corner of the planet
in real time, living color, and stereophonic sound.
The biggest machine on earth is the international telephone network.
It
allows you to call this minute, on a lark, your neighbor, your friend in New
Zealand, or the Department of Sanitation in Tokyo. And we got used to it!
Behind the scenes, of course, there is a substantial investment in technology
going into this, and more effort is required to keep up with society’s ever-rising
demands. Consider international calls: For some time satellites seemed to be
the most efficient and elegant means. Just a decade or two later, they were
no more up to the growing task, and a new, earthbound technology took over:
optical fiber transmission.
V
VI
Absent a Telephone, a Bicyclist Had to Save the World
Meanwhile, the amount of data handled by fibers exceeds anything that
older technology could have handled ever. Today’s Internet traffic would not
exist without fiber, and the cost of a long-distance phone call would still be as
expensive as it was a quarter century ago.
Optical fibers, mostly made of glass but sometimes also other materials, are
the subject of this book. The development toward their maturity we enjoy to-
day was mostly driven by the challenges of telecommunications applications.
Research has faced quite a number of questions concerning basic physics of
guided-wave optics, and many researchers around the world toiled for answers.
As a result, fibers can do more than was anticipated: Besides the obvious appli-
cation in telecommunications, they have also become useful in data acquisition.
This is why engineers and technicians working in either field need to know not
only their electrical engineering, but increasingly also some optics. At the same
time, it emerges that nonlinear physical processes in fibers will lead to exciting
new technology.
This book has its origin in lectures for students of physics and engineering
which I gave at the universities in Hannover, M¨unster, Rostock (all in Germany),
and Lule˚a (Sweden). The book first appeared in the German language. It was
well received, but the German-speaking part of the world is not very big, and I
heard opinions that an English version would find a larger audience.
The book presents the physical foundations in some detail, but in the in-
terest of limited mathematical challenges, there is no fully vectorial treatment
of the modes. On the other hand, I found it important to devote some space
to nonlinear processes on grounds that over the years, they can only become
more relevant than they already are. I proceed in outlining the limitation of
the data-carrying capacity of fibers as they will be reached in a couple of years,
i.e., at a time when the student readers of this book will have entered their
professional life as engineers or scientists, dealing with these questions. For the
English edition, I have expanded certain sections slightly, to keep up to date
with current developments.
It is my hope that both natural scientists and engineers will find the book
helpful. Maybe physicist will think that some segments are quite “technical,”
while engineers may feel that a treatment of nonlinear optics may be not so much
for them. My answer to that is that either subject is required to form the full
picture. In this context, it is sometimes unfortunate that the structure of our
universities emphasizes the distinction between natural scientists and engineers
more than is warranted. I envision that, in analogy to electronics engineers, we
will see the emergence of photonics engineers. They would have good practical
skills on the technical side and at the same time a deep understanding of the
underlying physical mechanisms.
Contents
I
Introduction
1 A Quick Survey
II Physical Foundations
2 Treatment with Ray Optics
2.1 Waveguiding by Total Internal Reflection . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.2 Step Index Fiber . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.3 Modal Dispersion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.4 Gradient Index Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.5 Mode Coupling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.6 Shortcomings of the Ray-Optical Treatment . . . . . . . . . . . .
3 Treatment with Wave Optics
3.1 Maxwell’s Equations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.2 Wave Equation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.3 Linear and Nonlinear Refractive Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.3.1 Linear Case . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.3.2 Nonlinear Case . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.4 Separation of Coordinates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.5 Modes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.6 Solutions for m = 0 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.7 Solutions for m = 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.8 Solutions for m > 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.9 Field Amplitude Distribution of the Modes
. . . . . . . . . . . .
3.10 Numerical Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.11 Number of Modes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.12 A Remark on Microwave Waveguides . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.13 Energy Transport . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4 Chromatic Dispersion
4.1 Material Dispersion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.1.1 Treatment with Derivatives to Wavelength . . . . . . . . .
4.1.2 Treatment with Derivatives to Frequency . . . . . . . . .
4.2 Waveguide and Profile Dispersion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.3 Normal, Anomalous, and Zero Dispersion . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.4
Impact of Dispersion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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VII
VIII
Contents
4.5 Optimized Dispersion: Alternative Refractive Index Profiles . . .
4.5.1 Gradient Index Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.5.2 W Fibers
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.5.3 T Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.5.4 Quadruple-Clad Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.5.5 Dispersion-Shifted or Dispersion-Flattened? . . . . . . . .
4.6 Polarization Mode Dispersion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.6.1 Quantifying Polarization Mode Dispersion . . . . . . . . .
4.6.2 Avoiding Polarization Mode Dispersion . . . . . . . . . .
4.7 Microstructured Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.7.1 Holey Fibers
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.7.2 Photonic Crystal Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.7.3 New Possibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5 Losses
5.1 Loss Mechanisms in Glass . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.2 Bend Loss . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.3 Other Losses
5.4 Ultimate Reach and Possible Alternative Constructions
. . . . .
5.4.1 Heavy Molecules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.4.2 Hollow Core Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.4.3
Sapphire Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.4.4 Plastic Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
III Technical Conditions for Fiber Technology
6 Manufacturing and Mechanical Properties
6.1.1 Historical Issues
6.1.2
6.1.3 How Glass Breaks
6.1 Glass as a Material . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.2 Manufacturing of Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.2.1 Making a Preform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.2.2 Pulling Fibers from the Preform . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.3 Mechanical Properties of Fibers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.3.1 Pristine Glass . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.3.2 Reduction of Structural Stability . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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7 How to Measure Important Fiber Characteristics
101
7.1 Loss . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
7.2 Dispersion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
7.3 Geometry of Fiber Structure
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
7.4 Geometry of Amplitude Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
7.4.1 Near-Field Methods
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
7.4.2 Far-Field Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
7.5 Cutoff Wavelength . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
7.6 Optical Time Domain Reflectometry (OTDR) . . . . . . . . . . . 114