May 1976, 218-224. In a typical situation a 1 cm diameter preform is drawn down into a fiber with an outside diameter of about 100 microns. Fiberoptics and Laser Handbook . It is a very fine strand of very special glass which may be only 125 microns in diameter. With the advent of the fiber-optic network, our world has entered into a new age of communications.
Optical fibers are extremely thin strands of glass, which are made up of many layers.
They use laser light to carry information, sounds and images over very large distances. Optical communications systems have the capability of carrying thousands of telephone calls or television programs simultaneously, which is just one of their superior aspects in comparison to our current systems. The optical fiber, in it's.0005 meter diameter entirety, is made up of three layers, the core, cladding, and the coating. The core is the center of the fiber, which is made of pure glass. This is the region in which the laser light carrying the images, sounds, or data travel at the speed of light.