This book provides comprehensive insights into optical fibers, covering their structure, light-guiding mechanisms, materials, manufacturing, and applications. It traces the evolution from telephone systems to modern digital communications, highlighting the crucial role of optical fibers in handling vast amounts of data at high speeds. Compared to other technologies like copper cables and satellite links, optical fibers excel in long-distance data transmission, and they are integral to wireless communications as well. The text details the various effects that can degrade signals during transmission and delves into nonlinear processes, which differ significantly from those in electrical cables. These nonlinear phenomena are essential for innovative applications, such as solitons—special light pulses that can recover from disturbances. The book begins with the fundamentals of ray and beam optics, progresses through fiber structure and optical elements, and explores cutting-edge applications and research in high-speed data transmission and fiber optic sensors in metrology. Written in a pedagogical style, it caters to students of physics and electrical engineering, as well as technicians and engineers in optical technologies. The updated edition includes new sections on nonlinear phenomena and the latest application trends.
