The airy fiber: an optical fiber that guides light diffracted by a circular aperture

I. Gris-Sánchez, D. Van Ras, T. A. Birks

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

24 Citations (SciVal)

Abstract

In theory, no more than 80% of the light diffracted by a circular aperture can be directly coupled into one mode of an ordinary optical fiber. To improve coupling efficiency, and illustrate an inverse method for designing optical fibers with a desired mode shape, we have made an optical fiber that guides an approximate Airy pattern as one of its modes. The fiber’s attenuation was 11.0 dB/km at a 1550 nm wavelength, the match between the fiber’s mode and the ideal infinite Airy pattern was 93.7%, and the far field resembled a top-hat beam. The guidance mechanism has strong similarities to photonic bandgap guidance.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)270-276
Number of pages7
JournalOptica
Volume3
Issue number3
Early online date7 Mar 2016
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 20 Mar 2016

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