Design and Characteristics of Diamond-Assisted Ring-Core Fiber for Space Division Multiplexing

Abstract

In this paper, a novel diamond-assisted ring-core fiber (DRF) is proposed. With the introduction of a low-refractive-index diamond-shaped region located in the center of the core, the proposed fiber effectively eliminates spatial degeneracy of the LPmn mode groups and maintains a low level of birefringence. Under the fiber structure parameters proposed in this paper, the effective refractive index difference (Δneff) between the spatial modes supported by the fiber in the entire C-band is greater than 2.25 × 10−4, and the Δneff between adjacent modes falls within the scope of (2.11~9.41) × 10−4. The degree of degenerate separation between the two polarization modes of all modes is very low, which is 2~3 orders of magnitude lower than that of the spatial mode. By discussing the mode characteristics of DRF and several other center-assisted ring-core fibers, the method that can be used to manipulate the spatial mode degenerate separation with structural symmetry is obtained, which can be applied to provide guidance for similar fiber designs. The proposed fiber structure is a promising candidate in space division multiplexing systems.

Keywords

• few-mode fiber
• degenerate mode
• space division multiplexing
• effective refractive index difference