Optical switching in glass fibre composite

Holmes, Christopher, Godfrey, Mike, Mennea, Paolo, Bull, Daniel and Barton, Janice (2022) Optical switching in glass fibre composite. Optics & Laser Technology, 152, [108105]. (doi:10.1016/j.optlastec.2022.108105).

Record type: Article

Abstract

We demonstrate for the first time the reconfigurability of optical signals within advanced laminated composite. The approach employs an ultra-thin planar optical circuit, embedded within glass fibre reinforced polymer (GFRP) that switches an optical input though Ohmic heating. This advance highlights new opportunities for optical reconfigurability within advanced composites, enabling data transmission redundancy and a consideration of branching optical fibre architectures.

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Accepted/In Press date: 21 March 2022

e-pub ahead of print date: 28 March 2022

Published date: August 2022

Additional Information: Funding Information: The research has been partly developed under EPSRC “Roll-2-Roll (R2R) manufacture of multilayer planar optics’, EP/V053213/1. For the purpose of open access, the author has applied a creative commons attribution (CC BY) licence (where permitted by UKRI, ‘open government licence’ or ‘creative commons attribution no-derivatives (CC BY-ND) licence’ may be stated instead) to any author accepted manuscript version arising. The authors thank James Gates for maintenance of the direct UV writing systems and Rex Bannerman for building the near-infrared characterization set-up. Publisher Copyright: © 2022

Keywords: composite material, optical fibre, optical switches, Advanced composite, Optical switch, Planar optics

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