Measurement standards to support photonics technology

It is noted that standards to support the emerging photonics/lightwave technology industry can be classified into two groups: physical primary standards maintained by national standards laboratories and standard measurement procedures agreed upon by domestic and international voluntary standards bodies. The measurement of absolute optical power leads the prioritized list of primary standards needs. The progress at NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) toward the development and distribution of optical power and other primary standards is reviewed. The developments of standard measurement procedures to characterize fiber, cables, sources, detectors, and lightwave systems by US and international standards bodies are discussed. The interaction between NIST and these standards groups to evaluate the precision and accuracy of several test methods is reported. It is pointed out that in some cases the evaluations resulted in technical changes to commonly accepted practices.<>