Optical device with non-equally spaced output ports
AssigneeJDS Uniphase Corporation
InventorsSheldon McLaughlin, Pierre D. Wall
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Abstract
The invention relates to multiport routing devices for routing optical signals which also provide beam attenuation by imparting a controllable offset between an optical beam and a selected optical port. A multiport optical routing device of the present invention has a plurality of non-equally spaced optical ports disposed in a row to enable beam offset for attenuation without substantially increasing optical crosstalk between adjacent ports in a compact port arrangement.
Claims15
A multiport optical routing device for routing and modifying an optical signal, comprising:
- an input optical port for receiving the optical signal;
- a plurality of output optical ports disposed in a row comprising first, second and third consecutive optical ports;
- and,
- a beam director optically coupled to the input port for receiving at least a portion of the optical signal therefrom and for directing said at least a portion of the optical signal as a light beam at an angle controlled by the beam director for coupling into one of the output optical ports;
- wherein the first, second and third consecutive optical ports are non-uniformly spaced with a first distance d1 between the first and second output optical ports that differs from a second distance d2 between the second and third output optical ports by at least 10%.
A multiport optical routing device for routing and modifying an optical signal, comprising:
- an input port for receiving the optical signal;
- a plurality of output ports disposed in a row;
- and,
- a beam director optically coupled to the input port for receiving at least a portion of the optical signal therefrom and for directing said at least a portion of the optical signal as a light beam at an angle controlled by the beam director for coupling into one of the output ports;
- wherein the plurality of output ports comprises pairs of ports wherein a separation d1 between ports within a same pair of ports is at least 10% smaller than a larger separation d2 between adjacent ports from different pairs of optical ports;
- and wherein the beam director is operable to direct the light beam to impinge at a side of a selected optical port with the larger separation d2 between ports so as to provide a controllable degree of attenuation for light coupled into the selected output optical port without coupling light into adjacent optical ports.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.