Bandwidth and transmission distance achieved by POF

Recent status of the polymer optical fiber (POF) for high speed data communication and telecommunication is reviewed. The GI POF was proposed for the first time 20 years ago at Keio University, and several methodologies to fabricate GI POF have been currently proposed worldwide. In this paper, we both theoretically and experimentally verify that the most transparent GI POF can be obtained by the polymerdopant system. The relation between the refractive index profile and the dispersion characteristics of the GI POF was quantitatively clarified. The refractive index profile of the GI POF obtained by the interfacial-gel polymerization process was controlled to enable to transmit the order of gigabit per second bit rate. Furthermore, the accurate approximation of the refractive index profile and consideration of mode dependent attenuation enabled to precisely predict the dispersion characteristics of the GI POF.