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A better understanding of stress effects that affect the bending losses in active and passive optical fibers allows us to improve fiber system designs and helps to optimize refractive index profiles in high power, large mode area laser fibers. Bending an optical fiber affects the light in a fiber core by two different phenomena. First, the curved shape of the waveguide changes the light propagation. The second phenomenon is the refractive index change caused by the mechanical stress in a bent optical fiber. The refractive index changes due to bending stresses are estimated by the elasto-optic and stress-optic models. The light propagation in a curved waveguide can be modeled by applying the electromagnetic wave theory together with the conformally transformed refractive index profiles that include the stress effects. The modeled refractive index profiles that include the bending stress-induced index changes are compared with the refractive index profiles that were measured from actual bent optical fibers. We tested if this comparison would allow us to estimate stress-optic coefficient C 2 values in stress-optic model. Measured bend loss values are compared to the bend loss values simulated with the modeled refractive index profiles.

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Refractive index profile of the core is a key design parameter in fiber lasers and amplifiers. During manufacturing, the initial information of the index profile is obtained from the preform, while ultimately the performance is defined by the index profile of the fiber. Depending on stresses and diffusion, the two profiles may be different. It is possible to predict more accurately the laser fiber refractive index when we apply a stress-induced index change model to the measured preform index profile data. The improved capability to predict the fiber index from preform increases the confidence in achieving the designed index profile in fiber, which enables faster process feedback and higher fiber yields.