Optical fiber & its Applications 2019 | What is Optical Fiber ?

What is Optical fiber & its Applications ?

[TOTAL INTERNAL REFLECTION]

Before talking about optical fiber, we should understand a phenomenon Known as - TOTAL INTERNAL REFLECTION ( TIR ).
When a ray of light travels from a denser medium to a rarer medium then it bends away from the normal and vice-versa.

In the above diagram, a light ray travels from water to the air and makes an angle θ1 with the normal and emerge out of the water at an angle θ2. In this case θ2 is greater than θ1 because water is denser than air and that is why light bends away from the normal.
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At a particular incident  angle, light become parallel to the surface of water, this angle is known as critical angle. if we manage to incident a light ray at an angle greater than critical angle then light ray will be reflected back in the water. This phenomenon is known as TOTAL INTERNAL REFLECTION ( TIR ).

Critical angle : The angle of incidence beyond which rays of light passing through a denser medium to the surface of a less dense medium are no longer refracted but totally reflected.

This technology is used in optical fiber for data transmission using light pulse travelling in a long fiber at much faster speed, which is much better than an electrical wire.
Optical fiber is usually made of plastic or glass in which the inner layer ( core ) is denser and outer covering ( Cladding )  of the fiber is rarer. 

An optical fiber is a flexible, transparent fiber made by drawing glass (silica) or plastic to a diameter slightly thicker than that of a human hair. Optical fibers are used most often as a means to transmit light between the two ends of the fiber and find wide usage in fiber-optic communications, where they permit transmission over longer distances and at higher bandwidths (data rates) than electrical cables.

Uses of Optical Fiber

• Communication 
• Sensors 
• Power transmission
• Optical-fiber lamps are used for illumination in decorative applications.
• Optical fiber is also used in imaging optics.
• Optical fiber is also widely exploited as a nonlinear medium

Advantages of Optical Fibre Communication

• Economical and cost effective
• Thin and non-flammable
• Less power consumption
• Less signal degradation
• Flexible and lightweight

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