Bachim Brent L, Gaylord Thomas K, Mettler Stephen C
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332-0250, USA.
Opt Lett. 2005 May 15;30(10):1126-8. doi: 10.1364/ol.30.001126.
Accurate nondestructive refractive-index profiling is needed in the modeling, design, and manufacturing of optical fibers and fiber devices. Most profile measurement techniques cannot correctly characterize fibers with small or irregular refractive-index variations over their cross sections. Microinterferometric optical phase tomography (MIOPT) is a technique that allows measurement of fiber refractive-index profiles exhibiting such variations. We present the first demonstration, to our knowledge, of MIOPT. The profile of a polarization-maintaining fiber is measured by MIOPT and shown to be in agreement with (destructive) fiber end-face measurements. MIOPT is also applied to the limiting case of a symmetric single-mode fiber.
