Fiber optics uses light pulses directed down a tiny glass fiber in order to relay information. Two different types of fibers are in use today, single mode, and multimode. Each of these types of fibers are made of three different parts, the core, the cladding, and the buffer. While singlemode and multimode fibers are composed of the same components, they do still differ.

Singlemode fibers are significantly smaller than multimode fibers. The core of the fiber is the most crucial part of any fiber. In the core is where the light signals themselves travel through. Because of how easily light r

efracts, the core must be completely transparent. Therefore, pure glass is not even transparent enough to transmit the signal and must be mixed with silica to attain perfection. The core is also the innermost and smallest part of a fiber, having a diameter of only eight microns. The average human hair has a diameter of approximately 100 microns, making the core of a singlemode fiber about 1/13 the size of a human hair. Because the technology would not work if the light did not bounce down the fiber, the core must be encased in a covering that refracts the light and prevents any escape of light waves. For this, there is a layer of glass outside of the core called the cladding layer. In order for the cladding to refract the light waves, it is doped with special elements. The cladding layer expands the diameter to about 125 microns. Outside of the cladding is the protective covering called the buffering. The buffering is a plastic layer with only one purpose, to protect the glass fiber. With the buffering layer, the entire fiber has a diameter of about 900 microns.

Multimode fibers are somewhat different from singlemode. Multimode fibers have a much larger core than singlemode. The diameter of the core for multimode almost reaches that of a human hair with the core being about 62.5 microns. The core is larger because the light waves are emitted by a LED, light emitting diode which emits waves of 890 nanometers. Multimode fibers are only used short distances of three kilometers or less because of the light waves from an LED lose more signals than that for a laser. Multimode is also much cheaper than the single mode, which is the only reason they are used at all.

Singlemode fibers also use a different source to send the data than multimode fibers. In singlemode fibers, an infrared laser is used to send the light waves through the fibe

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Approximate Word count = 1255
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)