Method for connecting multi-core fiber, multi-core fiber, and method for manufacturing multi-core fiber
AssigneeFurukawa Electric Co., Ltd.
InventorsTsunetoshi Saito, Katsunori Imamura, Kengo Watanabe
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A multicore fiber 1 includes a plurality of cores 3 disposed at predetermined intervals and surrounded by a cladding 5. The multicore fiber 1 also includes a marker 7 formed apart from the cores 3. The refractive index of the marker 7 is different from those of the cores 3 and the cladding 5. For example, the marker 7 may be made of a material having lower refractive index than that of the cladding 5. In this case, for example, the cores 3 may be made of germanium-doped quartz. The cladding 5 may be made of pure quartz. The marker 7 may be made of fluorine-doped quartz. Further, the marker 7 may be an empty hole.
Claims14
A method for fusion splicing a multicore fiber in which at least one of objects to be spliced together is a multicore fiber including a plurality of core portions, a cladding portion surrounding the plurality of core portions, and a marker portion disposed apart from the plurality of core portions, the method comprising:
- disposing the multicore fiber to face an object to be spliced that includes a marker corresponding to the marker portion;
- determining a position of each of the core portions of the multicore fiber by use of the marker portion, and conducting rotation core alignment of the position with a position of a desired core portion of the object to be spliced;
- and
- fusing the multicore fiber with the object to be spliced,
- wherein
- the multicore fiber and the object to be spliced are fused together by discharges of three electrodes disposed in three directions on a cross-sectional surface of the multicore fiber, and
- the three electrodes are disposed at equal distances in a circumferential direction on three line-symmetric axes with respect to a disposition of the plurality of core portions on the cross-sectional surface of the multicore fiber, the three line-symmetric axes passing through only the core portion disposed at the center.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.