Hard polymer cladding fiber (HPCF) links for high-speed short reach 1 x 4 passive optical network (PON) based on all-HPCF compatible fused taper power splitter

We report a novel 4 x 4 hard polymer clad fiber (HPCF) splitter fabricated by a fusion and tapering technique showing an excess loss less than 4.58 dB and insertion loss of 10.50 dB, which can be directly applied in short reach (SR) HPCF optical links. The device also showed an excellent uniformity in the power splitting ratio with power fluctuation less than 0.25 dB over a wide spectral range, 600-900 nm, which can significantly alleviate the spectral requirements in transmitters and enable wavelength-division multiplexing. The 1 x 4 passive optical network SR HPCF link for Ethernet communication was experimentally demonstrated over 100 m of HPCF at the data rate of 1.25 Gb/s for the optical signal at 850 nm.