Polarisation conservation in single-mode fibres

There exist proper orthogonal elliptical polarisation states, which are maintained over long fibre length without converting. When one of the proper polarisation states is excited, orthogonal polarisation less than ?40 dB is confirmed after 5 km single-mode fibre transmission. It is also proposed that twisted single-mode fibres show a high degree of polarisation for any incident polarisation state. The polarisation characteristics are hardly affected by external perturbations.