Abstract

Optical fibre devices are assemblies of fibre components, often incorporating special fibre designs, to form functional optical fibre circuits with a complexity which increases annually. Fibre circuits can be thought of as a discrete technology which can exceed the complexity of integrated optics and which has a number of important attributes. These are: low intrinsic losses, low interconnection losses, polarisation independence and relatively-low manufacturing and assembly costs. However, it should be recognised that optical fibre devices are relatively large (ie long), they cannot easily be modulated, they have small electro-, acousto- and magneto-optic interactions, and a small third-order and a negligible second- order non-linearity. Notwithstanding these disadvantages, a number of successes have been achieved, notably four-port fused-taper couplers, photorefractive Bragg grating filters and the erbium-doped fibre amplifier (EDFA). It is the purpose of this review to provide a critical appraisal of current optical fibre device work and to examine future prospects for the technology in the light of a number of recent developments (eg new glasses). Fibre amplifiers will be covered elsewhere in the Conference.

© 1993 Optical Society of America