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•Article: Protect Fiber-Optic Cable From UV And IR Damage With Hot And Cold Mirrors

By ZC&R Coatings for Optics

It's important to understand what optical fiber is. Optical fiber is made of either glass, plastic or polycrystalline materials such as quartz and is intended to carry visible or infrared light from one end of the fiber to the other. The optical fiber is coated with a transparent cladding to enhance the refractive index of the fiber and is then surrounded by a buffer and a jacket for mechanical protection. The optical fiber functions by having light emitted from a source, such as a high energy arc lamp, diode laser or LED, coupled into the core of the fiber, which contains and directs the light to the other end of the optical fiber where it can be read as data or displayed as an image.

The various compositions of optical fiber have different strengths and weaknesses. For instance optical fiber used in long distance communication, such as those making up the backbones of the internet, are very likely composed of germanium dioxide doped silica glass, which has the benefit of a lower optical attenuation, but is often very expensive to implement when compared to Plastic optical fiber (POF) due to the special handling and installation techniques required.

Optical fiber has many practical applications from medical surgical headlamps to high end communications channels. For some industrial, medical or sensing applications where larger cores are needed than in standard data communications, a plastic-clad silica fiber or polymer-clad silica fiber (PCS) is used. Optical fiber is used in many different applications, many of which require that the light passing through the optical fiber be as bright as possible. This is often achieved through the use of high energy arc lamps.

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•Article: Protect Fiber-Optic Cable From UV And IR Damage With Hot And Cold Mirrors