welcome to lecture 3 have the FOA lecture series on fiber optics this time we're going to talk

about optical fiber.

Within the scope a fiber optic components, the fiber transmits a signal as light. The cable
protection fibers, splices join two fibers permanently, and connectors join fibers to connect to
active devices so they can be disconnected for rerouting, testing, and the like. And then this
hardware which holds everything together for this chapter we're going to focus optical fiber.
Within the optical fiber, the light is transmitted the core, is trapped in the core and optical
cladding that surrounds it. On top of that, there's a buffer or primary coating, made out usually
and curly plastic that protects the fiber from moisture damage. This is what we strip off, we'll
prepare the fiber for termination or splicing. Most fibers are all glass, some fibers have a glass
core, and plastic cladding, and some are all plastic the ones we called POF.
The secret of optical fiber works is total internal reflection. You seen this yourself when you
stick that step down in water and you see it banned that caused by the different index of
refraction between water an air. Well the core of the fiber and a clanging have different indices
of refraction and that use to reflect light at certain angles to totally trapped them in the fiber.
The angle which they're trapped is calling numerical aperture.
We divide fibers in the two types: multi mode and single mode. Multimode fiber has a large
core, that supports multiple raise we call the modes a light. Where a single mode fiber has a
very small core and it supports only one mode or rays of light. Because the different modes
supported in multimode fiber, it tends to have higher continuation in lower bandwith then
single mode fiber. Multimode fibers typically used in premises applications or local area
networks data links security systems. Where single mode fiber is used for all high speed,
long-distance outside plant applications.
Multimode fiber comes in two types: step index has a corner that's all the same material so
the light or the modes travel in straight lines basically bouncing from one side for the court to
the other. Graded index fiber has a core with varying index of refraction, that guides them out.
The light is traveling in the outside of the core is in a lower indexing refraction material and
actually travels faster. So it tries to keep all the modes and synchronization throughout the
entire finder.
There are different sizes of optical fiber, but the majority of fiber is glass fiber with the 125
micron cladding diameter. That's about 5000 inch, there are several different multimode sizes
with different core diameters 50 micron and 62.5 micron being the most popular. Although in
the past we've had 85 and 100 micron course. Plastic optical fibers very large fiber bottom
millimeter in diameter with a very thin cladding and HCS/PCS fiber has a glass core plastic
cladding, with the corner about 200 microns in a cladding about 250 micron.
The attenuation the optical fiber is caused by two factors: scattering and absorption.
Scattering is a inverse function of the wavelenght. In fact the fourth power the wavelength so

its got a longer wavelengths when a scattering goes down. Is also observed shit specific
wavelengths typically caused by the 0.8 radical which is sort of like water. That is left in the
fiber, in fact we make a low water peak fiber that reduces the absorption at those peaks to
allow the wavelengths to be used for wavelength division multiplexing
Because the attenuation the optical fiber is less at longer wavelengths, that's where we tend
to use them for transmission. Those longer wavelengths a car infrared light and it's mostly
invisible to the human eyes. Since the light in the optical fiber is invisible to your eye is
problem, if it is large enough in power to be harmful to your eyes, you can't see it. But you can
check the power level with a power meter, where digital camera. There's an FOA YouTube
video showing you how to use a digital camera to determine if there's light in the fiber
You can see the difference in attenuation in the optical fiber at different wavelengths by
looking at typical fiber specs. Multimode fiber for example, as a loss in 850 nanometers which
is just above the visible a 3 db per kilometer, well 1300 nanometers, it's down 1 dB per
kilometer. Instead of losing half the power per kilometer 1550 nanometers loses about 20
percent per km at 1300 nanomter. You can see the same specification changes occurred with
single-mode fiber and these are typical specs, the actual standard sometimes have much
higher losses just to make sure that all fibers can meet the minimum specifications. Those are
not typical specs.
Fiber has extremely good band with but not infinite. Within multimode fiber we have two
factors: Modal dispersion and chromatic dispersion. Modal dispersion is actually caused by
the different times it takes, each different mode of light of travel down the fiber, and step index
fibers they have much lower bandwidth because it lacks the compensation provided by the
graded index score upgraded multi mode fiber.
Both single-mode and multimode fiber suffer from chromatic dispersion, that caused by the
fact that different colors are wavelengths of light have different speeds through the glass core
the fiber and actuality the red light travels through the fiber faster than the blue light. So as
source that has a very broad spectral with are lots of colors in its spectrum like an LED suffers
much more chromatic dispersion and as a source with a very narrow wavelength like a laser
and that's one of the reasons for example even in multimode fiber that pixels transmit light
much further and faster in LEDs.
Long single-mode fibers, they're used typically for long-distance telecommunications have
other factors that affect the dispersion, for example polarization. Polarization means that the
light waves are traveling in different planes in the fiber. It's actually caused by stress on the
fiber, where the fact that the core the fiber is it perfectly round. Polarization mode dispersion
is very picky, it can vary with temperature were even when stressed on an aerial cable. It's a
very small effect but it's very important for long fiber operating at 42-100 gigabits per second
or more.

Multimode fiber comes in several different varieties, depending on its bandwidth, when used
with 850 nanometer pixel laser sources their typical high-speed systems used to premises
cabling. Single mode fiber has lot a different variations too, according to what distance it's
going to go, what wavelength it's going to be used at, and how it might be used for
wavelength division multiplexing. That is a very complex subject beyond the scope of this
simple lecture.
When the things people often want to know is, how fibers made. Well it's made from a
preform. You take a glass tube or a rod, you deposit material around it and heat it up to shrink
it into a solid glass rod. The size as the one you see in the top picture. From a preform like
this, you can pull as much as 50 kilometers optical fiber.
The preform is place in a pulling tower, its heated on the end and the fiber is pull is a then
strain from that giant preform. The fibers is pull carefully to control rate and monitored for
diameter and tested for strength. As it cools down a half is covered with that primary buffer
coating we talked about usually a UV cured acolyte. The fibers is then spooled up and fully
tested to make sure it meets all its specifications. Then those spooled are set to cable who
built it into cable, which is going to be the topic a very next chapter.
where the fiber optic Association professional society fiber optics we're happy to have you join
us for this lecture series on optical fiber and hope you enjoy all the lectures and videos on
our YouTube channel