Characteristics of stimulated Rayleigh scattering in optical fibers

The linewidth and the threshold of the stimulated Rayleigh scattering (STRS) in single mode fiber (SMF-28e), large effective area fiber (LEAF) and polarization maintaining fiber (PMF) have been studied using heterodyne detection to separate the Brillouin scattering with a fiber laser for the first time to the best of our knowledge. Experimental results show that the linewidth of STRS and spontaneous Rayleigh scattering are ~9 kHz, ~10 kHz, and ~11 kHz, and ~25 kHz, ~30 kHz, and ~27 kHz for SMF-28e, LEAF and PMF, respectively. The threshold power for STRS for 2km SMF-28e, 7km LEAF, and 100m PMF are 11dBm, 4.5dBm and 16.5dBm, respectively. The measured Rayleigh gain coefficient is a 2×10-13m/W for SMF-28e. Because of the properties of narrower bandwidth and lower threshold power of STRS in fibers, some of applications, such as narrower filter, could be realized.

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