Subject Name: Optical Communication

Subject Code: EC-7003

Semester: 7th
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Unit-1
Overview of Optical Fiber Communications (OFC): Motivation, optical spectral bands, key elements of
optical fiber systems.
Optical fibers: Basic optical laws and definitions, optical fiber modes and configurations, mode theory for
circular waveguides, single mode fibers, graded-index fiber structure, fiber materials, photonic crystal fibers,
fiber fabrication, fiber optic cables.

1.1 Motivation
Advantages of Optical Fibers
1) Long Distance Transmission-Optical Fibers have lower transmission losses compared to copper
wires. Consequently data can be sent over long distances, thereby reducing the number of
repeaters needed to boost and restore signals in long spans. This reduction in equipment and
components decreases system cost and complexity.
2) Large Information Capacity-Optical fibers have wider bandwidth than copper wires, so that more
information can be sent over a single physical line. This property decreases the number of physical
lines needed for sending a given amount of information.
3) Small Size and Low Weight- Because of low weight and small size optical fibers are used in aircraft,
satellites and ships where small light weight cables are advantageous, and in military applications
where large amount of cable must be reeled and retrieved rapidly.
4) Immune to Electrical Interference-Optical fibers are made up of a dielectric material, which means
it does not conduct electricity. This makes optical fibers immune to electromagnetic effects seen in
copper wires, such as inductive pickup from other adjacent signal-carrying wires or coupling of
electrical noise into the line from any type of nearby equipment.
5) Enhanced Safety-Optical fibers offer a high degree of operational safety, since they do not have the
problems of ground loops, sparks, and potentially high voltages inherent in copper lines.
6) Increased Signal Safety-An optical fiber offers a degree of data security, since the optical signal is
well-confined within the fiber and an opaque coating around the fiber absorbs any signal emissions.
This feature is in contrast to copper wires where electrical signals potentially could be tapped off
easily. Thus fibers are attractive in applications where information security is important, such as
financial, legal, government, and military systems.

1.2 Optical Spectral bands

Optical fiber communication uses near infrared spectral band ranging from 770-1675nm.The 770-910nm
band is used for shorter-wavelength multimode fiber systems, Thus this region designated as short
wavelength Or multimode fiber band. The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has designed six

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spectral bands for use in optical fiber communications within the 1260-1675nm region .These
long –wavelength band designations arose from attenuation characteristics of optical fibers and the
performance behavior of an erbium-doped fiber amplifier (EDFA).Table 1 defines these six spectral bands.

Table: 1 Six spectral bands of optical communication.

Name Designati Spectrum(n Origin in name
on m)
Original Band O-band 1260-1360 Original(first) region used for single-mode fiber links
Extended band E-band 1360-1460 Link use can extend into this region for fibers with
low water content
Short band S-band 1460-1530 Wavelengths are shorter than C band but higher
than E-band
Conventional C-band 1530-1565 Wavelength region used by a conventional EDFA
Band
Long band L-band 1565-1625 Gain decrease steadily to 1
Ultra-long U-band 1625-1675 Region beyond the response capability of an EDFA
band

1.3 Key Elements of Optical Fiber Systems

Basic function of optical fiber link is to transport a signal from communication equipment (e.g. telephone)
at one location to corresponding equipment at another location with a high degree of accuracy and
reliability. The key sections are transmitter, a cable, and receiver. Additional components include active and
passive components. Fig.1 shows the main constituents of optical fiber communication link.

Camera Telephone

Optical
Compute Optical
Transmitter Compute
Transmitter
Fig.1 Main constituents of optical fiber communication link.
Telephone Camera

The Transmitter consist of a light source that is dimensionally compatible with a fiber core and a associated
electronic control and modulation circuitry. In the 770-910nm light sources are generally alloys of GaAlAs.
At longer , wavelengths 1260-1675nm InGaAsP alloy is the principle optical source material.
Inside the receiver is a photodiode that detects the weakened and distorted optical signal emerging from
an end of optical fiber and coverts it to an electrical signal? The receiver also contains electronic
amplification devices and circuitry to restore signal fidelity. Silicon photodiodes are used in the 770-910nm
region. The primary material in the 1260-1675nm region is an InGaAs alloy.
Passive devices are optical components that require no electronic control for their operation. Among these
are optical filters, optical splitters, optical multiplexers, couplers. Active optical components, which require
an electronic control for their operation. These include light signal modulators, tunable optical filters,
variable attenuators, and optical switches.
When setting up an optical link engineers formulate a power budget and add amplifiers or repeaters when

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path loss exceeds available margin. Furthermore, when a link is being installed and tested, operational
parameters that should be measured include bit error rate, timing jitter, and signal to noise ratio as
indicated by eye pattern.

 Windows and spectral bands

Early applications in the late 1970s made exclusive use of the 770-910nm wavelength band. Where there is
a low loss window. Originally this region was referred to as a first window, since around 1000nm there was
a large attenuation spike due to absorption by water molecules. As a result of this spike, early fibers
exhibited a local minimum in attenuation curve around 850nm.
By reducing the concentration of hydroxyl ions and metallic impurities in the fiber material, in 1980s
manufacturers could fabricate optical fibers with very low losses in the 1260-1675 nm region. Since the
glass still contained some water molecules, a third order absorption spike remained around 1400nm. This
spike defined two-loss windows, these being second window centered at 1310nm and third window
centered at 1550nm.
1.4 Basic Optical Laws and Definitions
This i ludes s ell’s la , o epts of efle tio a d ef a tio .
When a light ray encounters a boundary separating two different media, part of the ray reflected back into
the first medium and the remainder is bent (or refracted) as it enters second material. This is shown in Fig.2
< . The elatio ship at the i te fa e is k o as “ ell’s la a d is gi e .
sin = sin
Angle of Incidence between incident ray and normal to the surface.
According to the law of reflection angle at which the incident ray strikes the interface is exactly equal to
the angle that the reflected ray makes with the same interface. As the angle of incidence in an

optically denser material becomes larger, the refracted angle approaches . Beyond this point refraction

is possible and light rays becomes totally internally reflected. Or in other words if the angle of incidence
is greater than the critical angle, the condition for total internal reflection is satisfied; that is light totally
reflected back into the glass no light escape from the glass surface .

Normal line

<

Refracted Ray

Material Boundary

Incident Ray
Reflected Ray

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Fig.2 Refraction and reflection of a light ray at a material boundary

Polarization components of light:
An ordinary light consist of many transverse electromagnetic waves that vibrate in a variety of
directions and is called un polarized light. Un polarized light can split into separate polarization components
either by reflection off of a nonmetallic surface or by refraction when light passes from one material to
a othe . The efle ted ea is pa tiall pola ized at a spe ifi a gle k o as B e ste ’s a gle the
reflected light is completely perpendicularly polarized. The parallel component of the refracted beam is
transmitted entirely into the glass whereas perpendicular component is partially refracted.
Polarization characteristics of light are important when examining the behavior of components such
as optical isolators and light filters. Three polarization sensitive materials are :Polarizer is a material or
device that transmits only one polarization component and blocks the other. Faraday rotator is a device
that rotates state of polarization of light passing through by a specific amount. Birefringent material or
double refractive crystals splits the light signal entering it into two orthogonally polarized beams. One of
the beams is called an ordinary ray or o-ray. The second beam is called the extraordinary ray or e-ray.

1.5 Optical Fiber Modes and Configurations, single mode fibers, graded-index fiber structure:
An optical fiber is a dielectric waveguide that operates at a optical frequencies guides light in a
direction parallel to it. Structure of optical fiber as shown in Fig.3.

claddin
core
Buffer Coating

Fig.3 Structure of optical Fiber

Cladding surrounds the core adds mechanical strength to the fiber and protects core from absorbing
surface contaminants. On the bases of variation in material composition optical fiber are of two types:
1) Step Index fiber- Refractive index of core is
uniform throughout and under goes abrupt changes at the cladding boundary. On the bases of
modes of propagation these are further classified as single mode step index and multimode step
index fibers. single mode fibers sustains only one mode of propagation as shown in Fig.4.
multimode fibers sustains many hundreds of modes of propagation as shown in Fig. 5.

Fig.4 Mono mode step index fiber

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Fig.5 Multimode mode step index fiber

2) Graded Index fibers- Refractive Index is made to vary as function of the radial distance from center
of the fiber. Further on the bases of modes of propagation these are classified as two types Mono
mode graded index fiber and multimode graded index fiber as shown in Fig.6. Multimode fibers
have large core radii due to which larger power can be launched. LED can also be used for launching
power in multimode fibers. But multimode fiber suffers from intermodal dispersion.

Fig.6 Multimode mode graded index fiber

Intermodal Dispersion: Optical Power in different modes travel with different velocity. Means mode arrive
at different times, thus causing pulse to spread out. This can be reduced by graded index fiber. Information
capacity of graded index fibers is greater as compared to the step index fibers (data rate transmission).
1.6 Fiber materials
Optical fibers are made from optically transparent glasses of these most common is silica which has
refractive index 1.458 at 850nm. To produce two similar materials having slightly different indices of
refraction for core and cladding, either fluorine or various oxides such as , , or are added
to the silica. Increase the refractive index where the doping the silica with fluorine or
decreases it.
1.7 Photonic Fibers
Core or cladding contains air holes, which run along the entire length of fiber. They are insensitive to
bending. They can deliver high power. These are of two types
1) Index guiding Fibers- Core is solid and cladding region contains air holes running along the length of
the fiber as shown in Fig. 7. Core and cladding are made up of same material for example pure
silica. Air holes in the cladding region lower the lower refractive index.
Solid

Air holes

Fig. 7 Index guiding photonic Crystal Fiber

Buffer

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2) Photonic Band Gap Fiber (PBG)- Hollow core, surrounded by

cladding region which contains air holes running along the fiber length as shown in Fig.8.

Hollow

Air holes

Buffer

Fig. 8 Photonic Bandgap Fiber

1.8 Fiber Fabrication:

For fabrication two basic techniques are used : Vapor phase oxidation process and direct melt process. In
vapor phase oxidation highly pure vapors and metal halides (e.g. and ) react with oxygen to
form white powder of particles. The particles are then collected on the surface of a bulk glass by one
of four different commonly used processes and sintered (transformed to a homogeneous glass mass by
heating without melting) by one of variety of perform. Preform is a precision fed into a circular heater
called the drawing furnace. Four different fiber fabrication process are as follows:
1)Outside Vapor Phase Oxidation(OVPO):Layer of particles called soot is deposited from a burner
onto a rotating graphite or ceramic mandrel. The glass soot adheres to this bait rod, layer by layer, a
cylindrical porous glass perform is built up. By properly controlling the constituents of metal halides vapor
stream during deposition process , the glass composition and dimension desired for core and cladding can
be incorporated into the perform.Bait rod rotates and moves back and forth under burner to produce
uniform deposition of glass soot particles along the rod.The process is shown through Fig.9

Burner Glass particles

Bait Rod
Fig. 9 Outside Vapor Phase Oxidation process of fiber fabrication
3.Modified Chemical Vapor Deposition(MCVD): The glass vapor particles arising from the reaction of
the constituent metal halide gases and oxygen flow through inside of a revolving silica tube. As the
particles are deposited, they are sintered to a glass layer by oxy hydrogen torch which travels
back and forth along the tube as shown in Fig.10.When the desired thickness of glass is has been
deposited, the vapor flow is shut off and the tube is heated strongly to cause it to collapse into a
solid rod perform. The fiber that is subsequently drawn from this perform rod will have a core that
consist of the vapor deposited-material and the cladding consisting of the original silica tube. This
method produces low loss graded index fibers.

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Bait Rod Glass particles

Reactants:
Metal halides +O2

Travelling Burner

Fig. 10 Modified Chemical Vapor Deposition

3.Plasma Activated Chemical Vapor Deposition (PCVD)
In this method as shown in Fig.11. deposition occurs within the silica tube. However a non
isothermal microwave plasma operating at low pressure initiates the reaction with the silica tube

held at temperatures in the range of 1000-1200 to reduce mechanical stress in the growing

glass films, a moving microwave resonator operating at 2.45Ghz generates a plasma inside the to
activate chemical reaction. This process deposits clear glass material directly on the tube wall; there
is no soot formation. Thus no sintering is required When one has deposited the desired glass
thickness, the tube is collapsed into a perform.

Bait Rod Glass particles

Plasma

Travelling Burner

Fig. 11 plasma Activated Chemical Vapor Deposition process

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3) Vapor Phase Axial deposition: A porous perform is

grown in axial direction by moving rod upward. Fiber can be fabricated in continuous lengths which
can affect process cost and product yields. The fact that deposition chamber and the zone melting
ring heater are tightly connected to each other in the same encloser allows the achievement of a
clean environment.

1.9 Fiber Optic Cables

An optical fiber cable is a cable containing one or more optical fibers that are used to carry light. The
optical fiber elements are typically individually coated with plastic layers and contained in a protective tube
suitable for the environment where the cable will be deployed. Different types of cable are used for
different applications, for example long distance telecommunication, or providing a high-speed data
connection between different parts of a building. Cables are fragile and are usually placed underground,
which makes them difficult and expensive to install. Some fiber-optic cables are installed above ground, but
if they break, they often need to be completely replaced, which is not cheap. Several layers of protective
sheathing, depending on the application, are added to form the cable as shown in Fig.12. Plastic strength
members and high tensile strength synthetic yarns are used to avoid electromagnetic

induction. Outer Sheath

Basic fiber binding Yarn strength member

Insulated Copper Buffered strength member

conductors
Paper / Plastic Binding
Polyurethane / PVC
Jacket

Fig.12 Schematic Structure of a Cable

Individual fibers or modules of bundled fiber groupings and optional copper wires for powering in line
equipment are wound loosely around the central buffered strength member. A cable wrapping tape and
other strength members such as Kevlar then encapsulate and bind these fibers grouping together.
Surrounding these components is tough polymer jacket and provides crush resistance and handles any
tensile stress applied to the cable so that the fibers inside are not damaged. Cables are categorized on the
bases of their application.
1)Armored Or Underground Cable: For direct burial or underground duct applications has one or more
layers of steel wire or steel sheath protective armoring below a layer of polyethylene jacketing. Strength
protects from gnawing animals such as squirrels or burrowing rodents often cause damage to underground
cables.
2) Underwater cables/Submarine Cables: Other layers are same as in normal cable but it has various water
blocking layers, one or more protective inner polyethylene sheaths and heavy outer armor jacket. They are
used in river, lakes and ocean environment.

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