Measurement of Polarisation Dependent Responsivity of Optical Fibre Power Meters and Optical Spectrum Analysers

D J Ives, National Physical Laboratory UK. ([email protected]) Abstract Many of the sources used in optical fibre systems are highly polarised and thus for highly accurate power measurements the polarisation dependent response (PDR) of the power meter becomes an important parameter. The use of Optical Spectrum Analysers (OSA) to test components and measure the relative powers in WDM systems requires the OSA to have a low PDR since the polarisation state may be a function of the wavelength. I report here the use of the fixed polarisation states measurement technique, similar to that used to measure PDL, to measure the PDR of a number of integrating sphere type detectors and an OSA. Definitions Similar to polarisation dependent loss, we can define a polarisation dependent response vector, , given by