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Fiber optics is a technology that uses plastic or glass conduits to carry light, transmitting data at high speeds with less signal degradation and immunity to electromagnetic interference. It has applications in medicine, consumer products, and physics. The fiber is coated to make it reflective on the inside, guiding light by refraction. Optical fiber was first used in dentistry and then in surgery. Refinements in the 1970s allowed for long-distance communication, making it possible to build huge communication backbones for the internet. Fiber optics is ideal for long-distance communication and can carry more information than wire while being safe to use in high-voltage environments.
Fiber optics is a term for any type of plastic or glass conduit intended to carry light. The principles behind it are actually quite old, but it has become an incredibly important technology in recent years, as the communication infrastructure has started using this fiber to transmit data at extremely high speeds. In addition to fiber optic communications, however, it has a number of applications in medicine, consumer products and physics.
This type of fiber offers a number of advantages over traditional wire, the most important being that there is significantly less signal degradation. Furthermore, it is immune to electromagnetic interference, which can seriously impede data transmission along normal metal cables. This also adds an extra safety measure, as optical fiber can survive an electromagnetic pulse that would destroy metal cables.
The principle behind optical fiber is quite simple: the fiber is coated to make it fully reflective on the inside, so that when light enters it, it reflects without losing any light and transmits the fiber to the other end. This basic idea, of guiding light by refraction, dates back to the 1840s. A number of practical applications were developed in the early 20th century, most notably the use of this fiber in dentistry to illuminate the inside of the mouth.
By the 1920s, the same basic technology was being used to transmit full images. Over the next decade, the technology was used practically to illuminate the interior of a doctor’s office, allowing for a much more precise operation. It continues to be used in surgery, especially to facilitate less invasive internal surgeries. The first true optical fiber appeared in the 1950s, and by the end of the decade experiments were underway with a type of fiber very similar to the one used today, with glass fibers covered in a transparent sheath.
In the 1970s, optical fiber began to be refined, reducing the noise in the signal. These refinements allowed for the possibility that fibers could be used to transmit actual communications over long distances. This made it possible to build huge communication backbones, which laid the foundation for the Internet. At the dawn of the 1980s, General Electric created a method by which extremely long wires could be stretched, up to 25 miles (40 km) at a time, making it even easier to build huge backbones.
Because of its low level of degradation or attenuation, optical fiber is ideal for long distance communications. While wire requires repeaters to be installed over short distances to make sure the signal remains strong, fiber optics can be stretched long distances without a repeater, dramatically reducing costs. Additionally, fiber is capable of carrying much more information than wire, making it preferable even over short distances, such as those within a single building network situation. Because fiber doesn’t conduct electricity in the same way as metal wire, it’s safe to use in high-voltage environments where traditional wiring could be dangerous.
