Trench-Assisted Multicore Fiber with Single Supermode Transmission and Nearly Zero Flattened Dispersion

Wei Wang,Ying Han,Haidong Xu,Fanchao Meng,Lantian Hou,Yuefeng Qi,Shi Qiu,Tianxu Lin,Chao Wang

doi:10.3390/app8122483

Abstract

A trench-assisted multicore fiber (TA-MCF) with single-supermode transmission and nearly zero flattened dispersion is proposed herein. By adding a simplified microstructure cladding with only one ring of low-index inclusions on the basis of the multicore fiber, the microstructure cladding and mode-coupling mechanism were jointly employed into the TA-MCF to modulate light transmission. This guarantees that the TA-MCFs had sufficient capability for wideband dispersion management when only pure, germanium-doped, and fluorine-doped silica glass with low index differences were chosen to form the TA-MCF. Analyses also revealed that the TA-MCFs have the merits of shorter cut-off wavelength and flatter-top optical intensity distribution compared with traditional multicore fibers. After the investigation of the structural parameters’ influences on the dispersion of the fundamental supermode, two TA-MCFs with single-supermode transmission and nearly zero flattened dispersion were designed. For the seven-core TA-MCF, the dispersion varying from −0.46 to 1.35 ps/(nm·km) in the wavelength range of 1.50 to 2.04 μm, with bending loss as low as 0.085 dB/km and 35-mm bending radius at 1550 nm was achieved with index difference less than 0.015. The TA-MCFs proposed herein have the advantages of being a quasi-single material, with an all solid scheme and simplified structure.

Highlights

In recent years, transmission capacity achieved several terabit/s using dense wavelength-division multiplexing (DWDM) systems [1]
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A trench-assisted multicore fiber (TA-Multicore fibers (MCFs)) was proposed by combining the advantages of MCFs and microstructure fibers (MSFs)

Summary

Introduction

Transmission capacity achieved several terabit/s using dense wavelength-division multiplexing (DWDM) systems [1]. Fibers with wideband nearly zero flattened dispersion are more preferable in DWDM systems, because they can reduce the GVD-induced temporal broadening, as well as keep a uniform response among different channels [2,3,4]. It is difficult to keep tens or even hundreds of cladding air holes from deformation for dozens of kilometers during fiber drawing, while the collapse of air holes makes the dispersion of the MSF deviate from the original design. The fragility of the air–silica structure makes it a huge technical challenge to employ flattened dispersion MSFs for optical fiber communication systems that are hundreds of kilometers long

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Methods

Conclusion