This book is based on a three-week course held in India in 2011. It has 20 chapters covering a wide range of topics, from the basics of optical fibers and guided wave optics to biophotonics. The first few chapters give a good fundamental review of modes from first principles, and then cover dispersion properties, fiber amplifiers, sensors, soliton dynamics, photonic crystal fibers, super continuum generation, plasmonics in guided media, and nonlinearity in stratified media. There is even a wonderful chapter of guided-wave Fourier optics.
Overall, the individual chapters are well-written and illustrated. The concepts are clearly explained and not lost in the mathematics. This would be an easy read for advanced undergraduates and graduate students who are interested in photonics research, especially guided-wave technology. The editors should be congratulated on their choice of topics in this coherent and self-consistent book.
Review by Vasudevan Lakshminarayanan, University of Waterloo, Canada
The opinions expressed in the book review section are those of the reviewer and do not necessarily reflect those of OPN or OSA.