Journal of the European Optical Society-Rapid Publications (Jan 2023)

Comments about birefringence dispersion, with group and phase birefringence measurements in polarization-maintaining fibers

  • Villedieu Thomas,
  • Lablonde Laurent,
  • Boiron Hugo,
  • Steib Adrien,
  • Mélin Gilles,
  • Robin Thierry,
  • Cadier Benoît,
  • Rattier Maxime,
  • Lefèvre Hervé C.

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1051/jeos/2022014
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 19, no. 1
p. 1

Abstract

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A recent JEOS-RP publication proposed Comments about Dispersion of Light Waves, and we present here complementary comments for birefringence dispersion in polarization-maintaining (PM) fibers, and for its measurement techniques based on channeled spectrum analysis. We start by a study of early seminal papers, and we propose additional explanations to get a simpler understanding of the subject. A geometrical construction is described to relate phase birefringence to group birefringence, and it is applied to the measurement of several kinds of PM fibers using stress-induced photo-elasticity, or shape birefringence. These measurements confirm clearly that the difference between group birefringence and phase birefringence is limited to 15–20% in stress-induced PM fibers (bow-tie, panda, or tiger-eye), but that it can get up to a 3-fold factor with an elliptical-core (E-core) fiber. There are also surprising results with solid-core micro-structured PM fibers, that are based on shape birefringence, as E-core fibers.

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