Characterization of Mode-Dependent Loss of Laser Inscribed Photonic Lanterns for Space Division Multiplexing Systems

We characterize the 12 x 12 frequency-dependent transfer matrix, H(omega), of a six port photonic lantern spatial-multiplexer in a single-scan across the C-band using a swept-wavelength interferometer. Eigenvalue analysis of H(omega) enables extraction of the mode-depedent loss and insertion loss.