Notes on suitable optical fiber cables

Step and graded index

Optical fiber cables consist of 2 concentric materials, the core and cladding, plus a protective (colored) jacket. The core and the cladding have a different index of refraction, causing the light waves (modes; a mode is a natural wave in the optical fiber) to be reflected back into the core at the boundary. Due to the step change in the index of refraction this type of fiber is referred to as step index. A gradual/parabolic transition between the index of refraction in the core and the coating (referred to as graded index) can be achieved by mixing the materials. In a graded index fiber the modes are gradually diffracted back to the core, leading to propagation-time compensation and significantly higher quality of the light pulse at the outlet compared with a multimode step index fiber, where the different light modes have different signal run times (mode dispersion) with associated front distortion.

Single mode

Single-mode fibers have a very thin core (9 µm) and therefore conduct only a single mode of the light used, with high signal quality and virtually without mode dispersion. They are only available as step index fibers. Due to the high signal quality they are suitable for large transmission bandwidths > 10 GHz*km and distances > 50 km. The refractive index profile of single-mode fibers is dimensioned such that the multipath propagation (intermodal dispersion), which is a problem with multi-mode fibers, is omitted – the signal light propagates in a single-mode fiber only in a single guided fiber mode, hence the designation ‘single-mode’. This makes considerably larger transmission distances and/or bandwidths possible, and the limiting effect that arises next is the color distortion of the transmitted mode.

Multimode

Multimode fiber-optics are manufactured as step index or graded index. Step index multimode fiber cables are suitable for transmission bandwidths up to 100 MHz*km and distances up to 1 km. Graded index multimode fiber cables with core diameters between 50 and 62.5 µm reach transmission bandwidths > 1 GHz*km and ranges > 10 km. Multimode means that the core of the fiber-optic cable is thick enough to enable several light modes to propagate reflectively in the cable.

There are different types of multimode fiber-optics, which are optimized for different wavelengths or transmission sources. Through the optimization of the fibers for different wavelengths, the attenuation differs with different transmission rates and the bandwidth/length ratio differs for the different fiber types. The exact values must be taken from the data sheet for the selected fiber in order to check whether the use of the selected fiber is wise.

• OM1: 62.5/125 µm, optimized for 1310 nm LEDs
• OM2: 50/125 µm, optimized for 1310 nm LEDs
• OM3: 50/125 µm, optimized for 850 nm VCSEL (vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser)
• OM4: 50/125 µm, optimized for 850 nm VCSEL (vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser)