Corning Incorporated
Illumination systems including light diffusing optical fibers with nano-sized particles, and light sources projecting light at an angle into an input end face of the optical fibers

Abstract:

An illumination system includes a light source, and an optical fiber having opposed first and second end faces, a core, a cladding surrounding the core, an outer surface, and a plurality of nano-sized structures configured to scatter light traveling within the optic fibers towards the outer surface. The light source has an effective numerical aperture NA.sub.O, the optical fiber has a numerical aperture NA.sub.LDF which is more than the effective numerical aperture NA.sub.O of the light source. The light source is optically coupled to the first end of the optical fiber such that a propagation pathway of light outputted by the light source forms an incident angle .theta.i, with respect to the first end face, that is non-orthogonal to the first end face and within approximately 5.degree. of sin.sup.-1 NA.sub.LDF-sin.sup.-1 NA.sub.O.