What is Optical Fiber Technology and How Does it Work?

Fiber optics has become a buzz in the technical world, especially in the IT industry these days. Everyone must have heard the name one or several times to date. Your broadband guy may come to you with an offer to upgrade your connection to the optical fiber. Or you may have heard how this cable has revolutionized the telephone industry in the past two decades. However, most of them don’t have an idea about this cable and why it is so special to everyone.

You must be wondering why this cable has become so much popular and how do Fiber Optics Work?. To get the answer to all the queries; here we will present to you a complete guide of the optical fiber technology.

Let’s start with the basics!

You must have been aware of the historical invention of the Roman to carry water from one place to another through pipes 2000 years back. Till today, they take pretty much pride in it. The fiber optic is almost the same way to carry phone calls and emails through the ‘pipe’.

Let’s dig a little deeper!

To understand the technology, we have to understand first how the information or telephonic data travels so far. The first and the most basic way is the landline telephone where the sounds are carried through the cable that delivered them to the exchange and finally exchange send them to the desired number through the cable only.

Then comes the mobile phone that has brought wireless technology. It sends and receives information through radio waves as there is no cable involved. Finally, there is the optical fiber technology that works a third way.

What is Optical Fiber Technology and How Does it Work?

The fiber optics technology is an upgraded way to send the data coded in the beam of light through glass or plastic pipe. Surprisingly, technology was first invented for doctors for endoscopy during the 1950s. It was designed to help the doctors to see the inside part of the human body without cutting it open. In the 1960s, the engineers used the same technology to transfer the telephone calls at light speed (i.e 300,000 km per second).

The fiber optics are thin and long glass or plastic wire that has almost the same diameter as human hair. There are cables that have fewer strands like two or a bundle of several hundred strands. Every single strand is able to carry around 25,000 telephone calls. So, you can imagine the capability of the entire fiber optics cable. As per the latest record, 178 terabits per second is the highest transmission capability by a single-mode fiber.

How does the Fiber Optics Cable work?

So, we have learned about the excellent capabilities of the Fiber Optics Cable. Through optical technology, the cable carries information from one place to another. The light signals are programmed with data at the transmitting source just the way see them on your computer screen. Then the data will be transmitted by light to the receiving end and finally, the light signals are decoded as data. The transmission medium in fiber optical technology is a pipe that carries signals in the form of light at a very high speed over a long distance.

For example, you want to send some data to your friend’s house living down the street through an optical fiber. You need to hook your computer up to a laser that will convert all the required electrical data of the computer to a light pulse series. Then you have to fire the laser to transmit the light down the cable. The light beams will travel down the cable and deliver at the receiver’s end. Your friend’s computer must have a photoelectric cell that will convert the light signal to digital data again so that the computer can understand and display the electrical information. In a nutshell, we can say that this is the basic can and string telephone theory that we hugely used in our childhood.

The functionality of the fiber optics Cable was Explained a Little Better!

To understand the functionality of the fiber optics in a better way, you have to imagine a long flexible pipe or even a simple drinking straw. Now imagine, that pipe or straw is several kilometers long. Now take your imagination to the next level and think that the inside of the pipe is coated with a high-quality pipe.

Now one of your friends at the other end of the pipe flashes a torch. The light will reflect off the mirrors and will reach the end you are in. Let’s presume that you and your friend have a preplanned code and you can send and receive any coded message by switching on and off the light. This is the basic concept of transmitting digital data through the fiber optics cable.

Here we are going technical aspects of the functionality of the Fiber Optical Cable:

The inside wall of the fiber optic cable is made of glass so that the light keeps going by bouncing on the wall repeatedly. Each photon of the light bounces down the pipe just like a sled ride until it reaches the other end.

The beam of light goes through the core of the cable or the middle part of the glass structure. To ensure that the light signal stays inside the pipe, there is another protective glass layer called cladding which is wrapped around the core. So, there is no scope that the light can leak out from the pipe.   

However, there is a certain condition called total internal reflection that helps the light to stay inside the pipe. When the light hits the glass at a really shallow angle, then it reflects it back.

The structure of the cable that consists of the core and the cladding is specially designed to keep the light inside the pipe only. The cladding is made of a different type of glass and for that, it does not absorb any light.

For that reason, the data delivered through the fiber optics cable are of optimal quality.