Two fiber-bundle-type FI/FO devices of low insertion loss and cross talk applied for connecting 13-core 5-mode fiber

Abstract

Two fiber-bundle-typed fan-in/fan-out (FI/FO) devices, “wavy hexagon-shaped silhouette” type (W-FI/FO) and “tortoise-shaped silhouette” type (T-FI/FO), have been proposed and manufactured based on tapering glass tubes for docking with a self-made 13-core 5-mode fiber. The W-FI/FO device consists of 19 5-mode fibers and has an extended layout based on the 13-core 5-mode fiber structure. It could dock multiple fibers with 19 or 13 cores of the same size standards. When connecting it with 13-core 5-mode, the average losses (ILs) of its five modes are 1.07 dB, 2.95 dB, 3.42 dB, 3.65 dB, and 4.38 dB. The cross talks of the five linearly polarized (LP) modes are −69.1 dB, −64.7 dB, −44.2 dB, −43.9 dB, and −39.1 dB. The T-FI/FO device has a similar core arrangement to the 13-core 5-mode fiber and its average ILs of the five LP modes are 0.23 dB, 1.31 dB, 2.09 dB, 2.66 dB, and 3.03 dB. The cross talks of its five LP modes between adjacent cores are −72.8 dB, −67.8 dB, −43.6 dB, −40.0 dB, and −35.3 dB. The IL and cross talk of the LP01 mode are of satisfactory values, which are 0.23 dB and −72.8 dB, respectively. These two proposed FI/FO devices are expected to be used for high-speed optical interconnection and fiber communication.