Influence of Manufacturing Parameters on the Steady-State Radiation Response of Radiation-Sensitive Optical Fibers

We study the radiation-induced attenuation (RIA) levels and kinetics at <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$1.53~\mu $ </tex-math></inline-formula>m, under X-rays, of a set of germanosilicate single-mode (SM) optical fibers designed with a small amount of phosphorus in their diversely doped claddings. In addition to this compositional aspect, the influence of several manufacturing parameters on the RIA is also discussed. We observe that a lower vitrification temperature of the preform (from <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$2000~^{\circ }$ </tex-math></inline-formula>C to <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$1600~^{\circ }$ </tex-math></inline-formula>C) leads to higher (about 20%) signal losses at this wavelength. Varying the drawing tension from 120 to 40 g has a negligible effect (<5%) on the fiber radiation response in this spectral range. In contrast, the GeP co-doping in the fiber cladding has a major impact. Moreover, the low dose rate dependence of the RIA could make these optical fibers interesting for dosimetry applications.