Nano-Engineered Yb2O3 Doped Optical Fiber: Fabrication, Material Characterizations, Spectroscopic Properties and Lasing Characteristics: A Review

This review summarizes the very recent work on development of Yb2O3 doped nano-crystalline YAG in a silica based preforms made by modified chemical vapour deposition (MCVD)-solution doping technique and under suitable thermal annealing of the preforms for next generation of optical fiber devices. There is a great need to engineer the composition as well as doping levels of different elements within the core glass during the preform making stages to generate phase-separated Yb2O3 doped yttria-alumino rich silica nano particles, with or without crystalline in nature, in the fibre. The discussion concentrates on making of Yb2O3 doped yttria-alumino rich YAG nano-crystals containing silica glass based perform, drawing of fibers containing phase-separated dielectric nano-particles along with material characterizations, study of spectroscopic properties, photo-darkening phenomena and lasing characteristics. Also, approaches that may be applied for the formation of yttria alumina rich phase-separated crystalline nano-particles and dielectric nano-particles within the preform and fiber core region respectively are discussed in this review.