7/7/2017 Encyclopedia of Laser Physics and Technology - acceptance angle in ber optics, numerical aperture

RPCONSULTING RPSOFTWARE RPENCYCLOPEDIA RPBUYER'SGUIDE

RPP HOTONICS
E NCYCLOPEDIA
combinedwithagreatBUYER'SGUIDE!

AcceptanceAngleinFiberOptics

B UYER ' S G UIDE

UsetheRPPhotonicsBuyer'sGuideto
findsuppliersforphotonicsproducts!Youwill
hardlyfindamoreconvenientresource.

A NALYZING THE I NJECTION OF

L IGHT INTO F IBERS
Waveopticsarerequiredforfullyunderstan
dingthedetailsoflaunchinglightintofibers.
ThesoftwareRPFiberPowercanbeused
tosimulatesuchthingswithnumericalbeam
propagation.Asanexample,seeacasestu
dy.

Definition:themaximumincidenceangleofalight
raywhichcanbeusedforinjectinglightintoafiber
coreorwaveguide
German:AkzeptanzwinkelinderFaseroptik
Category:fiberopticsandwaveguides
Howtocitethearticlesuggestadditionalliterature

Theacceptanceangleofanopticalfiberisdefinedbasedonapurelygeometricalconsideration(rayoptics):itisthemaximumangle
ofaray(againstthefiberaxis)hittingthefibercorewhichallowstheincidentlighttobeguidedbythecore.Thesineofthataccepta
bleangleiscalledthenumericalaperture,anditisessentiallydeterminedbytherefractiveindexcontrastbetweencoreandcladding
ofthefiber,assumingthattheincidentbeamcomesfromairorvacuum:

Here,ncore and ncladding are the refractiveindices of core and cladding, respectively, and n0 is the refractive index of the medium
aroundthefiber,whichiscloseto1incaseofair.

Figure1:Anincidentlightrayisfirstrefractedandthenundergoestotalinternalreflectionat
thecorecladdinginterface.However,thatworksonlyiftheincidenceangleisnottoolarge.

Theconceptofrayopticsisnotfullyappropriatefordescribingtheoperationdetailsofopticalfibers,becausewaveaspectsareim
portantparticularlyforfiberswithsmallcoresuchassinglemodefibers.Areallightbeam(forexample,alaserbeam)isnotwell
resembledbyaray,sinceitinevitablyhasbothafinitebeamradiusandafinitebeamdivergence.Therefore,thereisinrealitynota
welldefined transition between guidance and nonguidance, when a beam angle is varied. However, the acceptance angle gives at
leastsomeestimateconcerninghowlargeanincidenceanglemaybeforefficientlylaunchinglight.
Notethatthetermacceptanceanglealsoplaysaroleinnonlinearopticsseethearticleoncriticalphasematching.

Seealso:numericalaperture,fibers,waveguides,totalinternalreflection,fiberoptics
andotherarticlesinthecategoryfiberopticsandwaveguides

Ifyoulikethisarticle,shareitwithyourfriendsandcolleagues,e.g.viasocialmedia:

tweet teilen +1

RPPhotonicsConsultingGmbH,Dr.RdigerPaschotta(G+)AllrightsreservedworldwideContactandlegalinfo,declarationofdataprivacy

StandupforScience!

https://www.rp-photonics.com/acceptance_angle_in_ber_optics.html 1/1