Statistical treatment of the evolution of the principal states of polarization in single-mode fibers

A simple relationship is found for the evolution of the principal states of polarization (PSPs) and their differential group delay in fiber links. A simple expression is found, using the relationship, for the probability of the differential group delay (DGD), considering the evolution of the PSPs as a Brownian motion. The theory has been verified experimentally on an optical cable composed of 12 single-mode, shifted-dispersion fibers 2.2-km long. The results show that the DGD grows as the square root of the length when the length of the fiber is far larger than the correlation length of the perturbation. The measured value of DGD can vary substantially in two fibers belonging to the same ensemble, and in the same fiber, considering two frequencies differing by more than 5 nm