Abstract

Electrostriction in an optical fiber is introduced by interaction between the forward propagated optical signal and the acoustic standing waves in the radial direction resonating between the center of the core and the cladding circumference of the fiber. The response of electrostriction is dependent on fiber parameters, especially the mode field radius. We demonstrated a novel technique that can be used to characterize fiber properties by means of measuring their electrostriction response under intensity modulation. As the spectral envelope of electrostriction-induced propagation loss is anti-symmetrical, the signal to noise ratio can be significantly increased by subtracting the measured spectrum from its complex conjugate. We show that if the transversal field distribution of the fiber propagation mode is Gaussian, the envelope of the electrostriction-induced loss spectrum closely follows a Maxwellian distribution whose shape can be specified by a single parameter determined by the mode field radius.

Mode-profile dependence of the electrostrictive response in fibers

Eric L. Buckland
Opt. Lett. 24(13) 872-874 (1999)

Measurement of the frequency response induced by electrostriction in optical fibers

Andrea Fellegara, Andrea Melloni, and Mario Martinelli
Opt. Lett. 22(21) 1615-1617 (1997)

Electrostrictive contribution to the intensity-dependent refractive index of optical fibers

Eric L. Buckland and Robert W. Boyd
Opt. Lett. 21(15) 1117-1119 (1996)

Measurement of the frequency response of the electrostrictive nonlinearity in optical fibers

Eric L. Buckland and Robert W. Boyd
Opt. Lett. 22(10) 676-678 (1997)

Electrostrictive cross-phase modulation of periodic pulse trains in optical fibers

Andrea Fellegara and Stefan Wabnitz
Opt. Lett. 23(17) 1357-1359 (1998)