Nanostructure Core Fiber With Enhanced Performances: Design, Fabrication and Devices

We report a new type of silica-based all-solid fiber with a 2-D nanostructure core. The nanostructure core fiber (NCF) is formed by a 2-D array of high-index rods of sub-wavelength dimensions. We theoretically study the birefringence property of such fibers over a large wavelength range. Large-mode-area (LMA) structure with a typical high birefringence in the order of 10^-4 can be easily realized. The attenuation of the fabricated NCF is as low as 3.5 dB/km at 1550 nm. Higher macro- and micro-bending losses compared with those of the single-mode fiber (SMF) due to the reduced index difference have been observed experimentally, which suggests that the NCF is potentially useful for curvature and strain sensing applications. A fiber Bragg grating (FBG) inscribed in such a novel fiber is side-polished to make use of its evanescent field for refractive index sensing. The refractive index sensitivity obtained is one order of magnitude higher than that of the side-polished FBG in SMF, while the temperature and strain performances are comparable with those of the SMF-based FBG.