MICRO MASS AXIS ALIGNMENT DEVICE WITH PIEZOELEMENTS FOR OPTICAL-FIBERAND ITS APPLICATION TO OPTICAL CONNECTION

Fusion mass-splice devices for optical fibers have been developed for splicing fiber ribbons. However, these devices use only V-grooves to a lign the optical fiber axes. Thus, axis misalignment errors easily occ ur due to the following reasons: (1) accurate design of a V-groove is difficult; and (2) optical fibers have core eccentricity. These both c ause an increase in splice loss. We first proposed here some types of axis alignment device that can independently align individual optical fibers. Next, axis alignment experiments were performed with the desig ned device. Experimental results indicated that it will be possible to align a fiber core axis of 0.1-mu m order precision by using feedback control. The axis alignment range is approximately 20 x 20 mu m. The proposed axis alignment device was applied to the fusion mass-splice d evice by a researcher from another company. Average splice loss was 0. 05 dB for four fiber ribbons of 1.55-mu m DSF. These results show that the proposed device has enough performance for the fusion mass-splice device. Finally, we proposed a device for low-loss optical coupling b etween an optical waveguide plate and optical fibers.