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Vector Description of a Realistic Photonic Crystal Fiber

A. Ferrando, J.J. Miret, E. Silvestre, and P. Andres, Dept. d'Optica, Universitat de València, Spain; M.V. Andrés, Institut de Ciència dels Materials, Universitat de Valencia, Spain.

The most relevant property of periodic dielectric structures (i.e., photonic crystals) is the possibility of generating photonic bandgaps. A related phenomenon occurring in photonic crystal structures is light localization at defects. Although the previous phenomenon of light confinement at defects has already been analyzed in 2-D structures, the study of the guiding properties of dielectric crystals that have a 2-D periodicity in the x — y plane broken by the presence of a defect, but are continuous and infinitely long in the z direction—the so-called photonic crystal fibers (PCFs)—has not yet been performed. However, the experimental feasibility of these fibers has been recently proven. A robust single-mode structure was observed for an unusually wide range of wavelengths, a remarkable property not present in ordinary fibers.