Proceedings Article | 29 November 2011
KEYWORDS: Optical fibers, Glasses, Fiber lasers, Metals, Indium, ZBLAN, Silica, Spectroscopy, Multimode fibers, Infrared radiation
The availability of high quality optical fibers with transmission window, larger than that of silica fiber,
extends the use of optical fibers and open new application fields. There is increasing demand of optical
fiber with transmission over 2 microns, where silica is opaque, for applications as diverse as sensing, fiber
lasers and amplifiers, defense (IRCM), spectroscopy... No materials can fulfill all applications needs.
Engineers have to make some compromise when choosing the right materials for the right application.
Heavy metal fluoride glass is one of these materials. The glass, under bulk form, has a wide transmission
window from 0.3 up to 8 microns, without any absorption peaks.
Heavy metal fluoride glass fibers are drawn using the preform technique, the same technique used for silica
fiber. This technique has proven to allow good control of fiber dimensions and geometry. Fluoride glass
fibers with different exotics shapes have already been obtained, such as D-shaped, square, of centered fiber,
multi cladding fibers and microstructured fibers....
As far as active fibers are concerned, heavy metal fluoride glasses have low phonon energy and can contain
high concentration of active ions, rare-earth elements. Therefore, new laser lines have been already
demonstrated using fluoride glass fibers. Fiber lasers with output power exceeding 10 w have been
obtained by different groups.
This paper will present the latest development of fluoride glass fiber technology, including fibers optical
and mechanical properties, fiber lasers and power handling.
