All-optical switching based on nonradiative effects in doped fibers

Doped fibers are used for many purposes in fiber-optic communications and fiber sensors. These applications rely on the stimulated electronic transitions of dopant ions to produce a desired effect, such as gain (erbium doped fiber amplifiers and fiber lasers), refractive index modulation (switching) or absorption (fiber attenuators). In most devices it is advantageous to use short doped fiber lengths containing large numbers of dopant ions. However, high dopant concentrations are often accompanied by significant nonradiative decay processes that produce other effects, either beneficial or undesirable. The understanding of these nonradiative processes is critical to most doped fiber devices.;In this dissertation we report the first comprehensive study of the effects of nonradiative processes in optically pumped, highly doped fibers. We have developed a new method to measure the size and relative abundance of clusters in rare-earth-doped fibers. This enables us to predict the extent of nonradiative, heat-producing processes in these fibers. We have also developed analytical and numerical models to quantify the dynamic evolution of the temperature profile in the fiber and to predict the thermal phase modulation in the fiber due to this temperature increase. Ours is the first analysis to fully describe the thermal effects created in doped fibers in both the single short pump pulse regime and the continuous pumping regime, as well as in intermediate modes of operation. We have designed methods to determine the presence and extent of nonradiative decay mechanisms and to differentiate them from nonlinear optical effects. We present this analysis and experimental verification of our model using high concentration cobalt- and vanadium-doped fibers. Finally, we have expanded the number of configurations available for all-optical switching by developing both the analysis of the pumped nonlinear directional coupler (PNLDC) and the analysis of the self-terminating Sagnac loop switch. We have used this latter design and the thermal processes which we have studied to produce a fast ( ∼ 7 ns) all-optical switch in a short, environmentally stable Sagnac loop.