Application of Crossed Polarizer Method in the Measurement of Differential Group Delay of Optical Fibers

In this paper, we report the use of crossed polarizer technique to measure the differential group delay (DGD) of few-mode optical fiber (FMF). The windowed Fourier transform (WFT) is applied in the analysis of beat length measurement in the spectral domain to obtain the dependence of DGD as a function of wavelength. The birefringence of polarization-maintaining fiber (PMF) and the DGD of FMF are measured by applying our method. We discuss the noise background, the width of DGD peaks, and the possible errors introduced in the optical path in the modified crossed polarizer technique.