Photonic crystal fiber based enabling devices for optical communication applications

Abstract

Photonic Crystal Fiber (PCF) is a breakthrough in the realm of science and the research in this domain is booming at a fast pace. It has unrivalled advantages over conventional silica optical fiber. The fascinating advantage of PCF is its unique potential to engineer the desired characteristics by harnessing design flexibility. The structural parameters of PCF can be tailored to achieve desired properties such as high birefringence, endlessly single-mode operation, large mode area, flat dispersion characteristics, and so on, depending on the application. Telecommunication devices based on PCF has gained huge attention as it drives towards the goal of all-optical networks. The optical devices that play a vital role in Integrated Optical Systems such as coupler, polarization filter, polarization splitter, and wavelength coupler/splitter can be realized using PCF. In this research work, Finite Element Method-based software COMSOL Multiphysics 5.2a is used in the design and analysis of the proposed PCF structures. The design of PCF with different characteristics has been predominantly studied for years. However, there is still a lot of scope for a versatile PCF design with high birefringence, large nonlinearity, and negative dispersion characteristics that find suitable applications in optical communication systems. In this research work, a novel hybrid hexagonal lattice PCF structure is designed to achieve the aforementioned characteristics by arranging circular air holes within elliptical lattice instead of using elliptical air holes in order to reduce the adversities with the fabrication process. newline