Comparative study of noninterferometric measurement schemes for determination of optical fiber nonlinear coefficient - art. no. 700910

In this paper, various noninterferometric measurement schemes for determination of single-mode optical fiber nonlinear coefficient are reviewed, studied and discussed. All of proposed measurement techniques use one of the Kerr-related phenomena, which are self-phase modulation, modulation instability, cross-phase modulation or four-wave mixing. Some of the methods applied to determine the nonlinear coefficient are based on pulsed lasers instead of continuous wave sources. The brief description of each measurement scheme and method is given. This paper focuses on the comparison of different noninterferometric measurement schemes in terms of their construction set-up simplicity, equipment cost, measurement time and field usage. In many of the measurement techniques, presented in this paper, the accurate determination of the input power becomes a critical factor to reduce the measurement uncertainty. Versatility of testing the various types and lengths of fibers is also an important issue in the design of optical devices and systems.