What Is Fiber Optic Cable?

A fiber optic cable is a network cable that contains strands of glass fibers inside an insulated casing. They're designed for long-distance, high-performance data networking, and telecommunications. Compared to wired cables, fiber optic cables provide higher bandwidth and transmit data over longer distances. Fiber optic cables support much of the world's internet, cable television, and telephone systems.

In Shot, Fiber optic cables carry communication signals using pulses of light generated by small lasers or light-emitting diodes.

How Does Fiber Optic Cables Work?

The fibre itself is comprised of a core and cladding.

As explained below, these have different refractive indexes to aid the travel of light along the cable. A protective coating, jacket or strength members will then encompass the core and cladding. This is then surrounded by an armoured outer jacket which forms the visible part of the cable. This may be IP-rated for water-blocking purposes.

This second optical fibre diagram shows the basic principle of the technology and how it works.

Light enters at one end of the cable and travels through the highly refractive core, bouncing off the cladding which has a low refractive index for this exact reason. Once a beam reaches the end, it is dispersed at an approximately 60° angle and emitted to the target.

Advantages of Fiber Optic Cables

Fiber cables offer several advantages over long-distance copper cabling.

• Fiber optics support a higher capacity. The amount of network bandwidth a fiber cable can carry easily exceeds that of a copper cable with similar thickness. Fiber cables rated at 10 Gbps, 40 Gbps, and 100 Gbps are standard.

• Because light can travel for much longer distances over a fiber cable without losing its strength, the need for signal boosters is lessened.

• A fiber optic cable is less susceptible to interference. A copper network cable requires shielding to protect it from electromagnetic interference. While this shielding helps, it is not sufficient to prevent interference when many cables are strung together in proximity to one another. The physical properties of fiber optic cables avoid most of these problems.