**1. Introduction**

The goal of this chapter is to continue previous reviews on radiation effects in optical fibers [1] and on the use of optical fibers and optical fiber sensors in radiation related measurements [2],

© 2016 The Author(s). Licensee InTech. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

by referring to radiation effects in optical materials and some photonic devices. According to this vision, the chapter is organized to cover the interaction of ionizing radiation with some optical materials and optical fibers, followed by a reference to radiation effects on some photonic devices based on optical fibers. The discussion addresses radiation effects produced by both energetic photons and charged particles, as appropriate [3]. In this context, an overview of some recently published results in the field is included, with a focus on original authors' contributions.

The terrestrial radiation environments where optical and photonics components can be found include, but are not limited to, high energy physics experiments, nuclear power plants [3], fusion installations as the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor – ITER, or the Laser Mégajoule – LMJ [4–8], high power laser installations [9], nuclear waste repositories [10], high energy physics [11, 12], medical equipments for diagnostics or treatment [13]. On the other side, applications of optical components or photonic devices can be found in spaceborne instrumentation [14–16]. These environments involve various types of ionizing radiations, depending on the application considered: X-rays or gamma rays, electron beams, alpha particles, neutrons, protons, and Bremsstrahlung [3, 14, 17].
