  Optical fibres have already played a huge part in ground based astronomical
instrumentation, however, with the revolution in photonics currently taking
place new fibre technologies and integrated optical devices are likely to have
a profound impact on the way we manipulate light in the future. The
Anglo-Australian Observatory, along with partners at the Optical Fibre
Technology Centre of the University of Sydney, is investigating some of the
developing technologies as part of our Astrophotonics programme. In this paper
we discuss the advances that have been made with infrared transmitting fibre,
both conventional and microstructured, in particular those based on flouride
glasses. Flouride glasses have a particularly wide transparent region from the
UV through to around 7um, whereas silica fibres, commonly used in astronomy,
only transmit out to about 2um. We discuss the impact of advances in fibre
manufacture that have greatly improved the optical, chemical resistance and
physical properties of the flouride fibres. We also present some encouraging
initial test results for a modern imaging fibre bundle and imaging fibre taper.
