Influence of cabling procedure on polarization mode dispersion of optical fibers

Abstract

Presently, polarization mode dispersion(PMD) of cabled optical fiber has been regarded to be a more and more important parameter. But the effect of cabling to PMD wasn’t clear to people yet. So in this paper, we try to study the change of PMD during cabling of optical fiber. Based on elementary principles and testing standard of PMD, we introduced a method to test PMD more accurately in optical fiber which is in different status. Then we applied this test method to research change of PMD in naked and cabled optical fibers provided by different company, and got a conclusion that the PMD of optical fibers will lessen after being cabled. We researched variation of PMD in the stranded loose-tube cable and the center loose-tube cable consist of G.652 and G.655 optical fibers during cabling, and found two working procedure can have a obvious effect on PMD of optical fiber. Then we got some useful conclusion. Moreover, we proposed to sort PMD of optical fiber into three parts: Original PMD, Induced PMD and Stressremaining PMD. So we can understand more clearly origin and variation of PMD in optical fiber affected by many cause.