Abstract
We report on a theoretical and experimental investigation of the optical Kerr effect in the evanescent field of silica nanofibers immersed in several highly nonlinear liquids such as ethanol, acetone and water and we further compare them with air cladding. We provide formula of the effective nonlinear coefficients including the contribution of the nanofiber silica core and of the evanescent field for varying nanofiber diameter and for different surrounding media.
Highlights
Optical nanofibers are ultra-thin tapered optical fibers that feature unique optical properties, including a strong field confinement in the core, enhanced nonlinear effects, and a wide evanescent field that can interact with the surrounding medium and can modify or detect chemical elements [1]
Among third-order nonlinear effects, stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) has recently been evidenced in the evanescent field of tapered silica nanofibers dipped in nonlinear liquids such as ethanol and toluene [2]
It has been shown in particular that the evanescent Raman effect in the highly nonlinear liquid is stronger than the standard Raman effect in the silica nanofiber itself
Summary
Optical nanofibers are ultra-thin tapered optical fibers that feature unique optical properties, including a strong field confinement in the core, enhanced nonlinear effects, and a wide evanescent field that can interact with the surrounding medium and can modify or detect chemical elements [1]. Among third-order nonlinear effects, stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) has recently been evidenced in the evanescent field of tapered silica nanofibers dipped in nonlinear liquids such as ethanol and toluene [2]. It has been shown in particular that the evanescent Raman effect in the highly nonlinear liquid is stronger than the standard Raman effect in the silica nanofiber itself. We theoretically demonstrate that the evanescent Kerr effect can be stronger than that in the silica taper. We further report the experimental observation of the evanescent Kerr effect through measurements of the stimulated Raman-Kerr scattering in a silica nanofiber immersed in acetone. The evanescent Kerr effect is shown to give rise to a strong asymmetric spectral broadening of the first Raman order generated in the nonlinear liquid
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