Fabrication of Active Polymer Optical Fibers by Solution Doping and Their Characterization

Abstract

This paper employs the solution-doping technique for the fabrication of active polymer optical fibers (POFs), in which the dopant molecules are directly incorporated into the core of non-doped uncladded fibers. Firstly, we characterize the insertion of a solution of rhodamine B and methanol into the core of the fiber samples at different temperatures, and we show that better optical characteristics, especially in the attenuation coefficient, are achieved at lower temperatures. Moreover, we also analyze the dependence of the emission features of doped fibers on both the propagation distance and the excitation time. Some of these features and the corresponding ones reported in the literature for typical active POFs doped with the same dopant are quantitatively similar among them. This applies to the spectral location of the absorption and the emission bands, the spectral displacement with propagation distance, and the linear attenuation coefficient. The samples prepared in the way described in this work present higher photostability than typical samples reported in the literature, which are prepared in different ways.

Mode-dependent dye absorption in phthalocyanine-doped acrylic optical fiber

“…Doped POF has been reported in various applications. [13][14][15][16][17][18][19] We had previously reported POF sensors using fluorophores or dichroic dyes as dopants by using their absorption, emission, or radiative emission-absorption mechanism to produce improved sensing signals. [20][21][22][23] The problem is that all familiar dopants had absorption peaks in the range of 400-600 nm.…”

Geometric optics analysis of inverted graded index fibers

“…A few years later, Tsukada et al succeeded in manufacturing IGI fibers from polymers [13]. Consequently, there is a renewed interest in the study of these fibers because of their potential use in light amplification and in the design of chemical sensors through the evanescent field [14][15][16][17][18][19]. Likewise, IGI fibers are expected to play a key role in the development of solar energy technologies and boost the transition towards clean energy, since the manufacture of inverted graded index polymer optical fibers with embedded photo luminescent entities will enable their use as luminescent solar concentrators [20,21].…”

POF-Based Solar Concentrators Incorporating Dyes and Europium Chelates

“…Nowadays, some new dyes with high quantum yields and/or lower photodegradation (such as the latest Lumogen dyes) have also been employed in LSCs [8,10]. Both types of dopants (europium chelates and dyes) can be mixed with the MMA monomer during the polymerization process of the PMMA [3,4,11], or, alternatively, they can be incorporated into an undoped PMMA POF after its manufacture [12]. An additional advantage of PMMA is its elasticity, which allows for flexible POFs of large diameters, up to several millimeters, to be manufactured, thus facilitating the absorption of the solar energy when the optical fiber is illuminated sideways by the sun.…”