Sagar Institute of Science & Technology, SISTec

Gandhi Nagar, Bhopal

Made By:
Prof. Manish Soni
(Associate Prof. ECE Deptt )


Attenuation in Optical Fibers
Attenuation/Loss In Optical Fibers
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Mechanisms:
Bending loss
Absorption
Scattering loss

dBm refers to a ratio
with respect to a
signal of 1 mW

( )
o
o
o
o
o
=
=
out in
Power transmission is governed by the
following differential equation:

where is the attenuation coefficient
and P is the total power.
P (z)=P exp - Z
is usually expressed in dB/km
( / )
dP
P
dz
dB km o
o
| |
=
|
\ .
out
10
in
P 10
4.343
P
Note that positive means loss
Log
L
Bending Loss
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Fiber Optics Communication Technology-Mynbaev & Scheiner
Example bending loss
1 turn at 32 mm diameter
causes 0.5 db loss

Index profile can be adjusted to
reduce loss but this degrades
the fibers other characteristics

Rule of thumb on minimum
bending radius:
Radius>100x Cladding
diameter for short times
13mm for 125m cladding
Radius>150x Cladding
diameter for long times
19mm

This loss is mode dependent

Can be used in attenuators,
mode filters fiber identifier, fiber
tap, fusion splicing

Microbending loss
Property of fiber, under control
of fabricator, now very small,
usually included in the total
attenuation numbers
Bending Loss in Single Mode Fiber
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Mode Field distributions in straight
and bent fibers
Microbending Loss Sensitivity vs
wavelength
Bending loss for lowest order modes
Bending Loss
Outside portion of evanescent field has longer path
length, must go faster to keep up
Beyond a critical value of r, this portion of the field
would have to propagate faster than the speed of
light to stay with the rest of the pulse
Instead, it radiates out into the cladding and is lost
Higher-order modes affected more than lower-order
modes; bent fiber guides fewer modes
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Graded-index Fiber


For r between 0 and a. If =, the formula
is that for a step-index fiber

Number of modes is


( ) A
+
=
2
1
2
akn M
o
o
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
( )
o
|
.
|

\
|
A =
a
r
n r n 2 1
1
Mode number reduction caused by bending

(
(

|
|
.
|

\
|
+
A
+
=
3 / 2
2
2
3 2
2
2
1
kR n R
a
N N
straight bent
o
o
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Absorption
In the telecom region of the spectrum,
caused primarily by excitation of chemical
bond vibrations
Overtone and combination bands
predominate near 1550 nm
Low-energy tail of electronic absorptions
dominate in visible region
Electronic absorptions by color centers
cause loss for some metal impurities
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Electron on a Spring Model
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Mechanical Oscillator Model
Response as a function of Frequency
E-Field of a Dipole
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Vibrational absorption
When a chemical bond is dipolar (one atom more
electronegative than the other) its vibration is an
oscillating dipole
If signal at telecom wavelength is close enough in
frequency to that of the vibration, the oscillating
electric field goes into resonance with the vibration
and loses energy to it
Vibrational energies are typically measured in cm
-1

(inverse of wavelength). 1550 nm = 6500 cm
-1
.
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Overtones and combination bands
Harmonic oscillator selection rule says that
vibrational quantum number can change by only
1
Bonds between light and heavy atoms, or
between atoms with very different
electronegativities, tend to be anharmonic
To the extent that real vibrations are not
harmonic, overtones and combination bands are
allowed (weakly)
Each higher overtone is weaker by about an order
of magnitude than the one before it


Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Overtone absorptions in silica
Si-O bond fairly polar, but low frequency
01 at 1100 cm
-1
; would need six quanta
(five overtones) to interfere with optical
fiber wavelengths
OH bonds very anharmonic, and strong
01 at 3600 cm
-1
; 02 at 7100 cm
-1
;
creates absorption peak between windows

Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Attenuation in plastic fibers
C-H bonds are anharmonic and strong, about
3000 cm
-1

First overtone (02) near 6000 cm
-1

Combination bands right in telecom region
Polymer fiber virtually always more lossy than
glass fiber
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Absorptive Loss
Hydrogen impurity leads to OH bonds whose first
overtone absorption causes a loss peak near 1400
nm
Transition metal impurities lead to broad absorptions
in various places due to d-d electronic excitations or
color center creation (ionization)
For organic materials, C-H overtone and combination
bands cause absorptive loss
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Photothermal deflection spectroscopy
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
HeNe Detector
Arc
lamp
Lock-in
amplifier
Chopper
Lens
Sample
cuvette
Scattering loss: from index discontinuity
Scatterers are much smaller than the
wavelength: Rayleigh and Raman
scattering
Scatterers are much bigger than the
wavelength: geometric ray optics
Scatterers are about the same size as the
wavelength: Mie scattering
Scatterers are sound waves: Brillouin
scattering
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Raman scattering
A small fraction of Rayleigh scattered light
comes off at the difference frequency
between the applied light and the frequency
of a molecular vibration (a Stokes line)
In addition, some scattered light comes off at
the sum frequency (anti-Stokes)

Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Mie scattering from dimensional
inhomogeneities
Similar effect to microbending loss
Mie scattering depends roughly on
-2
;
scattering angle also depends upon
In planar waveguide devices, roughness on
side walls leads to polarization-dependent loss
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Teng immersion technique
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Detector Motor stage
Tunable IR laser
Lock-in Amplifier
Chopper
Intrinsic Material Loss for Silica
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Rayleigh Scattering ~ (1/)
4
Due to intrinsic index variations in amorphous silica
Spectral loss profile of a Single Mode
fiber
Sagar Institute of Science & Technology
(SISTec)
Fundamentals of Photonics - Saleh and Teich
Spectral loss of single and Multi-mode
silica fiber
Intrinsic and extrinsic loss components for silica fiber