Paper
29 September 2004 High-performance antireflection coatings for telecommunications
Ian C. Stevenson
Author Affiliations +
Abstract
The demands of the optical communications industry have resulted in a dramatic increase in the performance requirements for thin film optical filters. Complex coatings are now manufactured with a level of control that was almost unthinkable a decade ago. In the area of anti-reflection coatings for optical fibers and laser diodes, not only has there been a push towards much lower reflectance requirements, the measurement methods and terminology are different. AR coatings are expected to have optical return losses (ORLs) of -40dB to -50dB, corresponding to reflectance values of 0.01% to 0.001%. By comparison, an element in a typical precision optics system might have an AR requirement of < 0.1% (-30dB). From a manufacturing standpoint, these requirements pose two problems: how to make such coatings, and how to measure them. In this work we review the progress towards routine manufacture of such ultra low reflectance coatings. We examine both the process control issues and the obstacles that must be overcome in the reflection measurement.
© (2004) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Ian C. Stevenson "High-performance antireflection coatings for telecommunications", Proc. SPIE 5527, Advances in Thin Film Coatings for Optical Applications, (29 September 2004); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.549230
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Cited by 1 scholarly publication.
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KEYWORDS
Reflectivity

Antireflective coatings

Error analysis

Optical coatings

Manufacturing

Optical fibers

Semiconductor lasers

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