Prospects For The Emergence Of A Sol-Gel Waveguide Technology

This paper reviews a worldwide effort to make fiber by sol-gel. Two routes: the all-gel and the hybrid are described. In the latter, a vapor-deposited core member is overclad with gel-silica subsequently to be drawn to fibers. Recently, bodies weighing more than 1 Kg have been cast, dried and consolidated. Taken together these reports suggest that sol-gel processing is approaching the threshold of commercialization.© (1989) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.