MULTICORE FIBER CONNECTION METHOD AND MULTICORE FIBER CONNECTOR USING SAME

摘要

A method of connecting multicore fibers 2 includes a shaping step S2 of shaping end surfaces 50 to be connected of the multicore fibers 2 by heating the end surfaces 50 of the multicore fibers and a fusing step S3 of fusing the shaped end surfaces 50 to each other. The multicore fibers 2 satisfy Y ‰¥ 20, where a distance from a center of a core 11 located on the outer periphery side of a clad 20 to a side surface of the clad 20 is defined as Y µm. The shaping step S2 includes heating the end surfaces 50 to satisfy 0 X/Y ‰¤ 0.0054Y + 0.268, where a distance in a longitudinal direction from a portion of each multicore fiber 2 located at an end in the longitudinal direction on each shaped end surface 50 to a position at which the end surface 50 and the side surface of the clad 20 meet each other is defined as X µm.