The standard fiber optical trap relies on the same principle as the optical trapping, but with the Gaussian laser beam delivered through an optical fiber. If one end of the optical fiber is molded into a lens-like facet, the nearly gaussian beam carried by a single mode standard fiber will be focused at some distance from the fiber tip. The effective Numerical Aperture of such assembly is usually not enough to allow for a full 3D optical trap but only for a 2D trap (optical trapping and manipulation of objects will be possible only when, e.g., they are in contact with a surface ).