High-power performance of single-mode fiber-optic connectors

We measured the continuous wave (CW) laser-induced damage threshold of single-mode fiber-optic connectors at 1550 nm. Clean standard physical contact and angled physical contact connectors did not show any evidence of damage for 10 min exposures of 1 W or 3 W. Defective connectors with scratched or undercut endfaces showed identical high-power tolerance as clean connectors without defects. Samples contaminated with carbon black-doped acrylate showed drastic optical failure signatures at approximately 50 mW. Contaminated connectors with expanded mode field diameters ranging from 20 to 62 /spl mu/m showed higher failure thresholds than standard connectors with 10-/spl mu/m spot sizes. We observed that the optical failure threshold power level (P/sub failure/) increased linearly with spot size for the highly contaminated connectors used in this study.