Experimental study on stimulated Rayleigh scattering in optical fibers

The linewidth, the threshold, and frequency shift of the stimulated Rayleigh scattering (STRS) in single mode fiber (SMF-28e), large effective area fiber (LEAF) and polarization maintaining fiber (PMF) have been studied using heterodyne detection to separate the Brillouin scattering with a fiber laser for the first time to the best of our knowledge. Experimental results show that the linewidth of STRS and spontaneous Rayleigh scattering are ~9 kHz, ~10 kHz, and ~11 kHz, and ~25 kHz, ~30 kHz, and ~27 kHz for SMF-28e, LEAF and PMF, respectively. The threshold power for STRS for 2 km SMF-28e, 7 km LEAF, and 100 m PMF are 11 dBm, 4.5 dBm and 16.5 dBm, respectively. The measured Rayleigh gain coefficient is a 2 × 10(-13) m/W for SMF-28e. Also, weak frequency shift could be observed when input power is large enough before SBS occurred. Because of the properties of narrower bandwidth and lower threshold power of STRS in fibers, some of applications, such as narrower filter, could be realized.