A theoretical and experimental study of optical fibers

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Rochester. College of Engineering and Applied Science. Institute of Optics, 1960.Fiber optics, a new and fascinating field of modern optics, has become the subject of much speculation. Many possible applications of fibers have been suggested, some of which may be feasible, others unrealistic. Most of these applications of fiber optics can not be properly evaluated because very little information is available describing the optical fibers. The objectives of this work were to measure the optical properties of various fibers and fiber bundles and to outline some of the theoretical properties of optical fibers which are imperfect as well as geometrically and optically perfect. The theoretical considerations are limited to those in which geometrical optics is valid. The achievements of the thesis include the derivation of equations which describe the optically interesting properties of practical fibers. A series of experiments were performed on single fibers and fiber bundles to measure those properties, with which the formulae were concerned, as well as properties beyond the theoretical study. By fitting the experimental results to the numerical evaluation of the theoretical equations, the optical parameters characterizing the internal reflectivity and absorption coefficient of the fibers were deduced. In the course of the research, some work of immediate interest was done on practical applications of fiber optics to experimental nuclear physics and cinefluorography. These results are not included in the thesis explicitly, but are referred to herein