Multicore fiber consists of several optical fibers, which are buffered inside a single jacket. Multicore fiber can also be arranged and consolidated inside of a further jacketing. This arrangement of fiber can be referred to as space–division multiplexing since the buffered optical fibers are spatially separated while arranged within a single jacket.
Applications for MCF include:
- Access and metro optical networks
- Wireless base stations
- Data center connectivity, backplane, and inter-chip communications
- Next-generation optical amplifiers
- Downhole sensing in oil exploration applications
- Pipeline monitoring