January 23, 2009--Fibercore (Southampton, England), developer and manufacturer of specialty optical fibers and a U.K.-based subsidiary of Cisco Systems, launched the SM300, a single-mode fiber with an undoped silica core, designed specifically for high-power medical and biotechnical applications. The fiber will be showcased at Photonics West (24 - 29 January 2009) on Fibercore Limited's booth #6071.
SM300 is suitable for applications that require a single mode and/or high beam quality to be delivered in ultraviolet, blue, or green wavelengths (300 nm to 560 nm) such as laser Doppler velocimetry (LDV), laser Doppler anenometry (LDA), holography, and two-photon spectroscopy.
The new fiber addresses the problem of photo-darkening in conventional fibers when transmitting more than a few milliwatts in the ultraviolet, blue, or green portions of the spectrum. The SM300 fiber utilizes an un-doped silica core with a fluorinated silica cladding rather than a conventional germanium-doped silica core. The advantage of this is that with the vast majority of the power traveling in pure silica, the generation of germania defects that have been so damaging to transmission is no longer an issue. With a cutoff wavelength below 300 nm, the long-wavelength portion of the ultraviolet spectrum is also accessible.
Furthermore, the numerical aperture is relatively low; typically between 0.1 and 0.11, maximizing the model area, minimizing the power density, and increasing the non-linear threshold. This is important in addressing nonlinear, typically Brillouin, scattering.
For more information, go to www.fibercore.com.
--Posted by Gail Overton, gailo@pennwell.com.