Abstract

As progress is being made toward the development of fiber-optic systems, real applications are surfacing that require economical means to monitor and control the optical power propagating in a fiber. These applications include timedomain reflectometry,¹ source stabilization,² source linearization,³ wavelength multiplexing,⁴ branching networks,⁵ and full duplex transmission.⁶ Many different fiber-optic components are already being developed to fill these needs,^{7-1 3} but a component developed for one application is generally not useful in another application. This paper describes a basic fiber element that does lend itself to use in each of these applications. The element is called an access port, and it is used to make a variety of compact, yet effective, components for controlling optical power in multimode fibers.

© 1979 Optical Society of America