Optical fibers with special shaped cores drawn from 3D printed preforms

A novel assembly method which is combined with 3D printing technology is proposed for fabricating optical fiber preforms. The special shaped claddings with complementary structures of the cores are designed and printed through 3D printing technique. The special shaped cores with the material of polycarbonate (PC) are assembled together with the printed claddings consisting of acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS) copolymer with the complementary holes and drawn to the optical fibers. Compared with the traditional methods of fabricating the preforms, this method can easily realize the fabrication of the optical fibers with special shaped cores.