Sumitomo Electric Industries, Limited

Kiyotaka Murashima

Masakazu Shigehara

Akira Inoue

Ryuichiro Sato

Toshihiko Homma

Tetsufumi Tsuzaki

Hiroyasu Toyooka

Toru Iwashima

Ken Hashimoto

Takemi Hasegawa

Manabu Shiozaki

Masaki Ohmura

Ryo Yamaguchi

Takeo Komiya

Toshikazu Shibata

Mitsuharu Hirano

Keitaro Iwai

To provide an optical probe for OCT and a method of manufacturing the optical probe that can reduce reflected light generated at a boundary portion between an optical fiber and a lensed fiber. An optical probe for OCT includes an optical fiber that transmits irradiation light and back-scattered light and a lensed fiber that is fusion spliced to an end face of the optical fiber, that emits irradiation light toward the inside of a living body while collimating the irradiation light, and that collects and guides back-scattered light to the end face of the optical fiber. A refractive index adjusting material is added to the lensed fiber, and the refractive index adjusting material is diffused in an end part of the optical fiber.

Optical probe for optical coherence tomography and manufacturing method therefor

An optical probe has an optical fiber, a deflecting element, and a protective tube. The optical fiber includes a glass filament having a first diameter for transmitting light between the proximal and distal ends thereof and a resin layer for covering the filament except for the distal end thereof. The deflecting element is made of glass in a circular form having a second diameter larger than the first diameter, and it is connected with the optical fiber and has an end-face having a normal vector whose angle relative to the central axis is larger than the critical angle. The protective tube surrounds a portion of the optical fiber and the entire length of the deflecting element and is adhered to the side of a deflecting optical element, whereas the inside diameter of the part covering the optical fiber is smaller than that of the part covering the deflecting element.

Optical probe

An optical fiber holder includes a holder main body and cord receiving groove. The holder main body has a fiber receiving groove and a first cord receiving groove. The fiber receiving groove receives and positions a coated optical fiber of an optical fiber cord with a cord jacket removed at the tip of the optical fiber cord. The cord receiving groove receives the cord jacket. A cord holding cover and a fiber pressing coverare attached to the holder main bodyfor movement between respective open closed positions. The cord holder cover includes a second cord receiving groove that cooperates with the first cord receiving groove to form an insertion through hole having a circular cross-section that allows for insertion of the optical fiber. The fiber pressing cover presses the coated optical fiber against the holder main body with the coated optical fiber in the fiber receiving groove.

Optical fiber holder and method for holding coated optical fiber

A spliced optical cable assembly is reinforced at a spliced portion of coated optical fibers to have adequate strength. The spliced optical cable assembly includes: a pair of optical fiber cables in which high-strength fibers are aligned in the longitudinal direction around coated optical fibers. The outer circumference of the coated optical fibers being covered by sheaths. The spliced optical cable assembly further includes a connecting portion in which the pair of optical fiber cables are connected and the coated optical fibers extend from the sheaths. Glass fibers exposed from the coating of the coated optical fibers spliced to each other. The connected portion is covered and formed into an integral unit, together with the high-strength fibers exposed from the sheaths, by a reinforcing tube placed over the optical fiber cables and caused to contract so that both ends of the reinforcing tube engage the sheaths of the respective optical fiber cables.

Spliced optical cable assembly

An optical power monitoring apparatus according to an aspect of the present invention has an input optical waveguide, a light receiver, and an output optical waveguide. The input optical waveguide has a light entrance end and a light exit end. The input optical waveguide accepts light from the exterior through the light entrance end and outputs the light from the light exit end. The light receiver absorbs part of the light from the light exit end of the input optical waveguide and transmits the other part of the light. The output optical waveguide has a light entrance end and a light exit end. The output optical waveguide accepts the light transmitted by the light receiver, through the light entrance end, and outputs the light from the light exit end. The light receiver is provided on an optical path from the light exit end of the input optical waveguide to the light entrance end of the output optical waveguide.

Optical power monitoring apparatus, optical power monitoring method, and light receiving device

Raman amplification pumping light output from a pumping light source unit is supplied to a Raman amplification optical fiber through an optical circulator. The remaining Raman amplification pumping light is detected by a light-receiving element through an optical circulator and bandpass filter. Signal light that has reached a Raman amplifier propagates through the Raman amplification optical fiber while being Raman-amplified. A control section controls the power or spectral shape of Raman amplification pumping light output from each of N pumping light sources included in the pumping light source unit on the basis of the power of the remaining Raman amplification pumping light, which is detected by the light-receiving element. Hence, a Raman amplifier capable of easily controlling gain spectrum flattening in the signal light wavelength band can be obtained.

Raman amplifier

In a diffraction grating device (), index modulations are formed along the longitudinal direction of an optical fiber () serving as an optical waveguide. The optical fiber () has a core region (), an inner cladding region (), and an outer cladding region () sequentially from the optical axis center. Index modulations are formed in both the core region () and the inner cladding region () of the optical fiber () in each of a plurality of regions Ato A(N is an integer; N&#x2267;2) separated from each other along the longitudinal direction of the optical fiber (). In the diffraction grating device (), regions A(n=1 to N) in which index modulations are formed in both the core region () and the inner cladding region () and regions B(n=1 to N&#x2212;1) in which no index modulations are formed alternately exist along the longitudinal direction.

Diffraction grating device

In this diffraction grating device manufacturing method, refractive-index-change-inducing light of a wavelength that induces a change in refractive index is irradiated onto an optical waveguide, thus forming a diffraction grating through refractive index modulation along the longitudinal direction of the optical waveguide. At this time, the position of irradiation of the refractive-index-change-inducing light onto the optical waveguide is swung in a direction perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of the optical waveguide.

Diffraction grating device manufacturing method, diffraction grating device manufacturing apparatus, and diffraction grating device

This invention relates to a diffraction grating device having a refractive index modulation formed in an optical waveguide region in a predetermined region in the longitudinal direction of the optical waveguide. In the diffraction grating device, a refractive index modulation is formed in the core region in a predetermined region in the longitudinal direction of the optical waveguide. In this diffraction grating device, the optical period of the refractive index modulation is substantially constant, the phase of the refractive index modulation is inverted at a phase inversion portion, and the number of phase inversion portions is one or two. In this diffraction grating device, the absolute value of a parameter R (equation ( )) is smaller than . According to this invention, a diffraction grating device capable of shortening the region where the refractive index modulation is formed and flattening the reflectance characteristic in the reflection wavelength band is provided.

Growing community of inventors

Yokohama, Japan

Kiyotaka Murashima