Preparation and application of functionalized photonic crystal fibres

Abstract

The concept of microstructured and photonic band gap fibres opens a wide range of flexibility to introduce specific functionality in fibre light guiding properties and to adapt optical fibres to specific applications. In addition to flexible structural parameters, the use of specific material properties further increases the design freedom in optical fibres. In order to demonstrate the wide functional capabilities of such fibres, we have investigated different index guiding and photonic band gap fibres made from pure and modified silica and from non‐silica materials. The main interest in the use of different materials than the well‐known high‐purity silica is to utilize special optical properties such as high nonlinearity, specific dispersion or extended infrared transmission windows. A main challenge for such unconventional materials is to transfer the excellent properties of silica‐based photonic crystal fibres, like low spectral loss or good durability, to the modified or non‐silica materials. The preparation of modified silica‐based photonic crystal fibres was implemented by the MCVD doping process or by the use of high‐melting lanthanium or lead silicate special glasses. Highly germanium‐doped silica rods were used for the preparation of index guiding and for band gap guiding fibres. The prepared fibres were investigated in their mode propagation properties and compared to model calculations. Application examples are presented for spectral fibre sensing and for supercontinuum generation. (© 2007 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)

Hyperspectral (fluorescence lifetime) imaging based on a UV-VIS enhanced supercontinuum source using high-order mode propagation

“…We used a custom made MSF [12,13] and we were able to achieve a regime quite different from the one reported in [8][9][10]. We found that using off-axis pumping and being able to carefully tune the pump wavelength close to first order mode ZDW we can very efficiently generate UV and visible light.…”

Microstructured fibers with highly nonlinear materials

“…However, a new approach for the supercontinuum generation exhibits in the use of high-order mode propagation in a microstructured fiber. Here the blue shift of the zero dispersion wavelength (ZDW) with increasing mode order will be exploited (Efimov et al 2003;D'Andrea et al 2007; Bartelt et al 2007).…”

Low loss coupling and splicing of standard single mode fibers with all-solid soft-glass microstructured fibers for supercontinuum generation

“…Due to the geometrical guiding MFSs enable obtaining properties such as the single-mode propagation over very broad wavelength range, very high nonlinearity and the ability to easily engineer their group velocity dispersion 4,5 . Due to the high refractive index contrast between glass and air, along with a freedom in choice of the air holes diameters and arrangement, one can precisely control dispersion behavior and nonlinearity of fibers 6 . The use of soft glasses to fabricate microstructured fibers brings another advantage to the wave guiding properties of MSFs, namely high nonlinearity, gain and transmission in the near infrared 8,9 .…”