In recent years, additive manufacturing has witnessed remarkable advancements, revolutionizing traditional manufacturing processes. Additive manufacturing has recently also moved into the field of glass processing using photopolymer-based resin containing fused silica nanoparticles. The optical losses of silica parts made from such nanocomposites were previously only quantified in sample lengths ⪅1 cm. Here, we significantly increase the accuracy of the optical loss measurement by fabricating optical fibers several meters long. The fibers were designed to consist of a silica core surrounded by a ring of six air-holes. The cores were either 3D-printed or cast from a fused silica nanocomposite. The materials used in this work are photocurable fused silica nanocomposites which can be either cast or processed with a DLP 3D-printer, and then cured by a UV-light source. Vitrification of the manufactured parts is achieved by subsequent debinding and vacuum sintering. The spectral loss was measured and compared with a fiber made entirely from ultra-high purity synthetic fused silica glass (Heraeus F300). We demonstrate that the fibers made using the nanocomposite show a loss below 4 dB/m in the whole Vis-NIR region (400-1700 nm), except for an OH-related peak at 1380 nm.
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