Lecture No: 09 Date: 11/02/2013

Period: VII
Topic: Attenuation, signal distortion in optical !ers
Attenuation:
Signal attenuation within optical bers, as with metallic conductors, is usually expressed in the
logarithmic unit of the decibel. The decibel, which is used for comparing two power levels, may
be dened for a particular optical wavelength as the ratio of the input (transmitted) optical power
Pi into a ber to the output (received) optical power Po
from the ber as
This logarithmic unit has the advantage that the operations of multiplication and division reduce
to addition and subtraction, while powers and roots reduce to multiplication and division.
!owever, addition and subtraction re"uire a conversion to numerical values which may be
obtained using the relationship
#n optical ber communications the attenuation is usually expressed in decibels per unit length
(i.e. d$ %m
&'
) following
Lecture No: 09 Date: 11/02/2013
Period: VII
Topic: Attenuation, signal distortion in optical !ers
( number of mechanisms are responsible for the signal attenuation within optical bers. These
mechanisms are in)uenced by the material composition, the preparation and purication
techni"ue, and the waveguide structure. They may be categori*ed within several ma+or areas
which include material absorption, material scattering (linear and nonlinear scattering), curve
and microbending losses, mode coupling radiation losses and losses due to lea%y modes. There
are also losses at connectors and splices.
Lecture No: 09 Date: 11/02/2013
Period: VII
Topic: Attenuation, signal distortion in optical !ers
Material absorption losses in silica glass fibers:
,aterial absorption is a loss mechanism related to the material composition and the fabrication
process for the ber, which results in the dissipation of some of the transmitted optical power as
heat in the waveguide.
Intrinsic absorption:
(n absolutely pure silicate glass has little intrinsic absorption due to its basic material structure
and the interaction with one or more of the ma+or components of the glass.
it does have two ma+or intrinsic absorption mechanisms at optical wavelengths which leave a low
intrinsic absorption window over the -.. to './ 0m wavelength range.
1ltraviolet absorption due to the stimulation of electron transitions within the glass by higher
energy excitations.
#nfrared absorption due to the interaction of photons with molecular vibrations within the glass.
The attenuation spectra for the intrinsic loss mechanisms in pure
GeO2SiO2 glass
Extrinsic absorption:
#n practical optical bers prepared by conventional melting techni"ues, a ma+or source of signal
attenuation is extrinsic absorption from transition metal element impurities. another ma+or
extrinsic loss mechanism is caused by absorption due to water (as the hydroxyl or 2! ion)
dissolved in the glass.
Lecture No: 09 Date: 11/02/2013
Period: VII
Topic: Attenuation, signal distortion in optical !ers
The measured attenuation spectrum for an ultralo!loss singlemode fiber
"solid line# !ith the calculated attenuation spectra for some of the loss mechanisms
contributing to the o$erall fiber attenuation "dashed and dotted lines#
%inear scattering losses:
3inear scattering mechanisms cause the transfer of some or all of the optical power contained
within one propagating mode to be transferred linearly (proportionally to the mode power) into a
different mode. This process tends to result in attenuation of the transmitted light as the transfer
may be to a lea%y or radiation mode which does not continue to propagate within the ber core,
but is radiated from the ber. #t must be noted that as with all linear processes, there is no change
of fre"uency on scattering.
3inear scattering may be categori*ed into two ma+or types 4ayleigh and ,ie scattering. $oth
result from the nonideal physical properties of the manufactured ber which are difcult and, in
certain cases, impossible to eradicate at present.
&a'leigh scattering: 4ayleigh scattering is the dominant intrinsic loss mechanism in the low5
absorption window between the ultraviolet and infrared absorption tails. #t results from
inhomogeneities of a random nature occurring on a small scale compared with the wavelength of
the light.
These inhomogeneities manifest themselves as refractive index )uctuations and arise from
density and compositional variations which are fro*en into the glass lattice on cooling.
The 4ayleigh scattering coefcient (64) can be defined as
Lecture No: 09 Date: 11/02/2013
Period: VII
Topic: Attenuation, signal distortion in optical !ers
7here5 8 is the optical wavelength.
n is the refractive index of the medium.
p is the average photoelastic coefcient.
9c is the isothermal compressibility at a ctive temperature T:
; is $olt*mann<s constant.
The 4ayleigh scattering coefcient is related to the transmission loss factor (transmissivity) of
the ber following the relation
where 3 is the length of the ber.
Lecture No: 09 Date: 11/02/2013
Period: VII
Topic: Attenuation, signal distortion in optical !ers
Lecture No: 09 Date: 11/02/2013
Period: VII
Topic: Attenuation, signal distortion in optical !ers
Mie scattering:
3inear scattering may also occur at inhomogeneities which are comparable in si*e with the
guided wavelength. These result from the nonperfect cylindrical structure of the waveguide and
may be caused by ber imperfections such as irregularities in the core=cladding interface, core=
cladding refractive index differences along the ber length, diameter )uctuations, strains and
bubbles. 7hen the scattering inhomogeneity si*e is greater than 8>'-, the scattered intensity
which has an angular dependence can be very large.
The scattering created by such inhomogeneities is mainly in the forward direction and is called
,ie scattering. ?epending upon the ber material, design and manufacture, ,ie scattering can
cause signicant losses. The inhomogeneities may be reduced by
(a) 4emoving imperfections due to the glass manufacturing process@
(b) Aarefully controlled extrusion and coating of the ber@
(c) #ncreasing the ber guidance by increasing the relative refractive index difference.
(onlinear scattering losses:
2ptical waveguides do not always behave as completely linear channels whose increase in
output optical power is directly proportional to the input optical power. Several nonlinear effects
occur, which in the case of scattering cause disproportionate attenuation, usually at high optical
power levels. This nonlinear scattering causes the optical power from one mode to be transferred
in either the forward or bac%ward direction to the same, or other modes, at a different fre"uency.
#t depends critically upon the optical power density within the ber and hence only becomes
signicant above threshold power levels.
The most important types of nonlinear scattering within optical bers are stimulated $rillouin
and 4aman scattering, both of which are usually only observed at high optical power densities in
long single5mode bers. These scattering mechanisms in fact give optical gain but with a shift in
fre"uency, thus contributing to attenuation for light transmission at a specic wavelength.
!owever, it may be noted that such nonlinear phenomena can also be used to give optical
amplication in the context of integrated optical techni"ues.
Stimulated )rillouin scattering:
Stimulated $rillouin scattering (S$S) may be regarded as the modulation of light through
thermal molecular vibrations within the ber. The scattered light appears as upper and lower
sidebands which are separated from the incident light by the modulation fre"uency. The incident
photon in this scattering process produces a phononB of acoustic fre"uency as well as a scattered
photon. This produces an optical fre"uency shift which varies with the scattering angle because
the fre"uency of the sound wave varies with acoustic wavelength. The fre"uency shift is a
maximum in the bac%ward direction, reducing to *ero in the forward direction, ma%ing S$S a
mainly bac%ward process.
$rillouin scattering is only signicant above a threshold powerdensity.
Lecture No: 09 Date: 11/02/2013
Period: VII
Topic: Attenuation, signal distortion in optical !ers
7here d and 8 are the ber core diameter and the operating wavelength, respectively, both
measured in micrometers, Cd$ is the ber attenuation in decibels per %ilometer and D is the
source bandwidth (i.e. in+ection laser) in gigahert*.
Stimulated &aman scattering:
Stimulated 4aman scattering (S4S) is similar to S$S except that a high5fre"uency optical
phonon rather than an acoustic phonon is generated in the scattering process. (lso, S4S can
occur in both the forward and bac%ward directions in an optical ber, and may have an optical
power threshold of up to three orders of magnitude higher than the $rillouin threshold in a
particular ber.
*iber bend loss:
2ptical bers suffer radiation losses at bends or curves on their paths. This is due to the energy in
the evanescent eld at the bend exceeding the velocity of light in the cladding and hence the
guidance mechanism is inhibited, which causes light energy to be radiated from the ber. The
part of the mode which is on the outside of the bend is re"uired to travel faster than that on the
inside so that a wavefront perpendicular to the direction of propagation is maintained. !ence,
part of the mode in the cladding needs to travel faster than the velocity of light in that medium.
Lecture No: 09 Date: 11/02/2013
Period: VII
Topic: Attenuation, signal distortion in optical !ers
(s this is not possible, the energy associated with this part of the mode is lost through radiation.
The loss can generally be represented by a radiation attenuation coefcient which has the form
where 4 is the radius of curvature of the ber bend and c', cE are constants which are
independent of 4. :urthermore, large bending losses tend to occur in multimode bers at a
critical radius of curvature 4c which may be estimated from
#t may be observed from the expression given in above F". that potential macrobending losses
may be reduced by
(a) designing bers with large relative refractive index differences@
(b) operating at the shortest wavelength possible.
An illustration of the radiation loss at a fiber bend+ The part of the mode in the cladding outside the dashed
arro!ed line ma' be re,uired to tra$el faster than the $elocit' of light in order to maintain a plane !a$efront+
Since it cannot do this- the energ' contained in this part of the mode is radiated a!a'
The above criteria for the reduction of bend losses also apply to single5mode bers. 2ne theory
based on the concept of a single "uasi5guided mode, provides an expression from which the
critical radius of curvature for a single5mode ber 4cs can be estimated as
where 8c is the cutoff wavelength for the single5mode ber. !ence again, for a specic single5
mode ber (i.e. a xed relative index difference and cutoff wavelength), the critical wavelength
of the radiated light becomes progressively shorter as the bend radius is decreased.
Lecture No: 09 Date: 11/02/2013
Period: VII
Topic: Attenuation, signal distortion in optical !ers