Continuously tunable fibre attenuator operating in the wavelength range near 1.5 {mu}m

• Published in: Quantum electronics (Woodbury, N.Y.) Vol. 34; no. 9
• Main Authors: Baum, Ol'ga I, Mishakov, Gennadii V, Sokolov, Viktor I, Varlamova, Nina V, Zapadinskii, Boris I
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 30.09.2004
• Subjects: ATTENUATION; CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSICS; ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION; ELEMENTS; FIBERS; FLUORINE; HALOGENS; MINERALS; NONMETALS; OPTICAL FIBERS; OPTICAL PROPERTIES; OXIDE MINERALS; PHYSICAL PROPERTIES; POLARIZATION; POLISHING; POLYMERS; RADIATIONS; REFLECTION; REFRACTIVE INDEX; SILICA; SURFACE FINISHING; SURFACES; TUNING; VARIATIONS; VISIBLE RADIATION; WAVELENGTHS
• DOI: 10.1070/QE2004V034N09ABEH002804
• ISSN: 1063-7818

A fibre attenuator is fabricated for the telecommunication wavelength range near 1.5 {mu}m in which a single-mode silica fibre with side polishing is used. The fibre surface is covered by a layer of fluorine-containing polymer with a large thermooptic coefficient. The principle of attenuator operation is based on a change in the conditions of total internal reflection for a guided mode in the polished region due to thermally induced variation in the refractive index of the fluoropolymer layer. The attenuator is insensitive to light polarisation, it has a continuously variable attenuation coefficient in the range 0.2-27 dB, and can be easily incorporated into fibreoptic links. (fibre optics)