Optical Fiber Technology 58 (2020) 102309

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Optical Fiber Technology

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Photonic crystal fibers with high birefringence and multiple zero dispersion T
wavelengths
⁎
Erlei Wanga, , Peng Chengb, Weining Zhaoc, Jia Lid, Qing Hane, Xiaodong Zhoua
a
School of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, ZhouKou Normal University, Zhoukou 466000, China
b
Luoyang Bearing Science & Technology Co., Ltd., Zhengzhou 450000, China
c
Shanghai Institute of Satellite Engineering, Shanghai 201108, China
d
The Hospital Affiliated to Zhoukou Normal University, Zhoukou 466000, China
e
Physics and Telecommunication Engineering, ZhouKou Normal University, Zhoukou 466000, China

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: A type of total internal reflection photonic crystal fiber (TIR-PCF) with high birefringence and multiple zero
Photonic crystal fibers dispersion wavelengths is presented. The optical characteristics are numerically investigated by using the full-
High birefringence vector finite element method. Results show that, by setting the geometrical parameters, the mode birefringence
Multiple zero dispersion wavelengths can reach to 2.28 × 10−2 at the wavelength of 1.55 μm, and two zero-dispersion wavelength points appear in
the infrared band, one of which emerges near the wavelength of 1.55 μm. It provides a new structure for large
birefringence photonic crystal fiber with multiple zero-dispersion wavelengths, and it could be widely used in
the fields of fiber polarization control, dispersion management, super-continuum generation and soliton pro-
pagation.

1. Introduction
Optical fibers which possess excellent high birefringence and dis-
persion properties play an important role in the development of optical
communication systems. However, the conventional fibers usually
cannot meet the requirements of fiber birefringence and dispersion
performance for optical communication system. Compared to the con-
ventional fibers, photonic crystal fibers [1] (PCFs, also called micro-
structured fibers or holy fibers) possess many unique properties, such as
endlessly single mode [2], high nonlinearity [3], high birefringence [4]
and flexible dispersion-tailoring [5]. So, it can effectively improve the
performance of optical communication systems. Optical fiber which
possesses high birefringence has an important application in the field of
optical sensing, such as interferometric optical fiber sensors. The use of
high birefringence fibers can ensure that the linear polarization direc-
tion remains unchanged and achieve high-precision measurement of
physical quantities. In order to improve the birefringence of PCF, all the
circular air holes are replaced by elliptical air holes [6–8]. Although the
birefringence reaches to the order of 10−2, the fabricating process of
this kind of PCF is very difficult [9]. There are the other methods re-
ported that part of the circular air holes are replaced by elliptical air
holes [10–16]. The birefringence reaches to the order of 10−2, but it is
almost impossible to fabricate the PCF that possessed two different
shapes of air holes (circular and elliptical) by using the present fabri-
cation techniques. During the propagation of optical pulse in the fiber,
the fiber dispersion will cause the pulse widen, resulting the pulse
overlap with each other, i.e. inter-symbol interference. The dispersion is
an important factor that limits the further increase of the optical
communication rate. Therefore, the zero-dispersion wavelength fiber is
essential to improve the quality of optical communications. In addition,
in the process of supercontinuum generation based on PCFs, the char-
acteristics of supercontinuum are closely related to the zero dispersion
wavelength of the fiber. So, it is important to obtain PCFs with zero-
dispersion wavelength. In 2008, Kudlinski [17] proved that a PCF with
two zero dispersion wavelengths has a higher power spectral density
than that which possesses one zero dispersion wavelength. Zheng [18]
designed a high birefringence PCF with a magnitude of 10−2, but there
was only one zero dispersion wavelength. Fang [19] studied the gen-
eration of supercontinuum in PCFs with two-zero dispersion wave-
lengths, and believed that PCF with two zero dispersion is more con-
ducive to the generation and control of supercontinuum. Sejin Lee [20]
designed a new PCF with a nearly flat zero dispersion in the wavelength
range of 1.44–1.61 μm. There are the other structures [21–25] reported
in recent years, although the structures have achieved excellent per-
formance in the birefringence and dispersion-tailoring (including the
zero-dispersion), the difficulty of fabrication is incredible.

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: wangerlei_me@zknu.edu.cn (E. Wang).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.yofte.2020.102309
Received 7 April 2020; Received in revised form 17 June 2020; Accepted 6 July 2020
1068-5200/ © 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
E. Wang, et al.
Fig. 1. Cross section of fiber structure.
Focusing on the above issues, a type of TIR-PCFs with all circular air
holes is proposed, unlike the PCF structures mentioned above, this type
of PCF can be fabricated by the “stack-and-draw” method [26]. The
modal birefringence and dispersion characteristics are investigated by
full-vector finite element method. Numerical results demonstrated that
the birefringence can reach to 2.28 × 10−2 at the wavelength of
1.55 μm, and two zero-dispersion wavelength points appear in the in-
frared band, one of which emerges near the wavelength of 1.55 μm. It
provides a new structure for large birefringence PCFs with multiple
zero-dispersion wavelengths, and it could be widely used in the fields of
fiber polarization control, dispersion management, super-continuum
generation and so on.
2. Theoretical basis
The cross section of proposed PCF is shown in Fig. 1. The back-
ground material is silica glass, of which the refractive index can be
obtained from the Sellmeier formula [27]. Air holes are arrayed in
rectangular lattice with the hole-pitch Λ. D and d stands for the dia-
meters of the big air holes and the other cladding air holes. Because of
the convenience for modeling, calculating and higher accuracy, the full-
vector finite-element method is adopted to calculate the characteristic
of PCFs. The electromagnetic wave equation of PCF is derived from the
Fig. 2. Mode fields of different polarization states, (a) X polarization state, (b) Y polarization state.
2
Optical Fiber Technology 58 (2020) 102309
Maxwell equations, as the following equation:
1 ω 2
∇ × ⎡ ∇ × E⎤ = ⎛ ⎞ εr × E
⎢μ ⎥ ⎝c⎠ (1)
⎣ r ⎦
where E , μr , εr , c and ω represent the electric field vector, the relative
permittivity, relative magnetic permeability, the velocity and frequency
of light in vacuum, respectively. The effective refractive index neff and
the mode propagation constant β can be obtained by solving Eq. (1),
and then the characteristics of PCF can be calculated through neff and β.
The mode birefringence (B) is an important parameter for polar-
ization characteristics, and it can be calculated by the following for-
mula (2):
B = |Re (neff − x ) − Re (neff − y )| (2)
where neff-x and neff-y are the effective index for X and Y polarization
mode, respectively.
The dispersion (D) cab be calculated by using formula (3):
λ d 2Re (neff )
D=−
c dλ2 (3)
where λ is the wavelength, Re(neff) represents the real part of neff.
3. Results and discussions
The mode field is an important property of PCF. Under the condition
of the wavelength λ = 1.55 μm, the mode fields for different polar-
ization states are shown in Fig. 2. The number of mesh degrees of
freedom is 61,896 and the scattering boundary conditions are adopted
in the calculation processes. It can be found that the mode fields of
different polarization states are confined in the core region, that is, it
meets the transmission requirement for optical fiber.
The birefringence behaviors of the proposed PCF for different geo-
metrical parameters are depicted in Fig. 3. The birefringence property is
enhanced by adopting the proposed PCF structure. It is clear that, no
matter how the geometrical parameter changes, the birefringence in-
creases with the increasing of wavelength λ. However, the bi-
refringence reaches a maximum at a certain wavelength, as shown in
Fig. 3(c). The birefringence increases with the decreasing of hole-pitch
(Λ) and the increasing of the big hole diameter (D), but it almost re-
mains unchanged with the cladding hole diameter before the bi-
refringence reaches the maximum. The optical fiber structure possesses
different confinement abilities to different polarization modes. The
confinement ability is weakened with the increasing of λ or the de-
creasing of D and d. When the incident wavelength is less than a certain
value (i.e., λ0), the confinement ability of fiber structure to different
E. Wang, et al.
Fig. 3. Birefringence of different geometrical parameters, (a) hole-pitch D = 1 μm, d = 0.8 μm; (b) cladding hole diameter Λ = 1.5 μm, D = 1 μm; (c) big hole
diameter Λ = 1.5 μm, d = 0.6 μm.
polarization direction states will not change abruptly, so the mode bi-
refringence continuous increases. When the incident wavelength is
larger than λ0, the mode field of one of the polarization states spreads
rapidly towards the cladding, and then the mode coupling occurred in
the cladding and the confinement loss increasing rapidly which are
responsible for reducing the birefringence. The confinement ability can
be measured by confinement loss, and the confinement loss can be
calculated by the imaginary part of the effective refractive index (i.e. Im
(neff)). The more divergent the mode field is, the weaker the limiting
ability is. In other words, the greater confinement loss is, the larger Im
(neff) is. When the structural parameters are Λ = 1.5 μm, D = 1 μm and
d = 0.6 μm, which is corresponding to the black line in Fig. 3(b), the
relationship between the Im(neff) and the wavelength is calculated, as
shown in Fig. 4(a). In order to represent the changing process of the
structural mode field more intuitively, the mode field adopts the
equipotential energy view, as shown in Fig. 4(b). It can be seen from
Fig. 4(a) that the Im(neff) of the Y polarization direction increases
sharply at a certain wavelength, while the Im(neff) of the Y polarization
direction does not change suddenly at this wavelength. It can be seen
from Fig. 4(b) that the mode field of X polarization direction gradually
diverges with the increasing wavelength, and the mode field in the Y
polarization direction also gradually diverges as the wavelength in-
creases, but the mode field changes suddenly at a certain wavelength
(about 1.6 μm). That is to say, it proves the phenomenon in Fig. 3.This
is also a new phenomenon in studying the birefringence of photonic
crystal fiber. No matter what the structure of the fiber is, such a wa-
velength λ0 (knee point wavelength of birefringence) can always be
found. The λ0 is related to the structure of the optical fiber. When the
optical fiber structure is circular symmetry, the value of λ0 is relatively
large, while for the optical fiber possesses non-circular symmetry
structure, the value of λ0 is small. This phenomenon can guide the
design of photonic crystal fiber to obtain the optimal birefringence
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Optical Fiber Technology 58 (2020) 102309
value at the desired wavelength, that is to say, in order to prevent the
occurrence of birefringence falling phenomenon before the target wa-
velength, the λ0 should larger than the target wavelength. It can be
found from Fig. 3 that the location of the maximum point shift towards
the long wavelengths but its value becomes larger with D, d or Λ de-
creases. Therefore, the maximum point operated at a given wavelength
can be obtained by adjusting the geometrical parameters.
In optical communication systems, dispersion will lead the light
pulses to overlapping with each other, so the dispersion is one of the
important factors which limit the optical communication speed.
Furthermore, the fibers which possess multiple zero-dispersion wave-
lengths play an important role in super-continuum generation [28].
Fig. 5 shows the variation effect of Λ, d and D on the X-polarization
dispersion of the proposed PCF. The dispersion characteristics are im-
proved by changing the geometrical parameters, and the zero-disper-
sion wavelength can be adjusted by adjusting the geometrical para-
meters. It can also be obtained that the zero-dispersion wavelength
appears red-shifted and the range of zero-dispersion wavelength gra-
dually decreases with the increasing of Λ. As d increases, the zero-dis-
persion wavelength also appears red-shifted, but the range of zero-
dispersion wavelength increases. The range of zero-dispersion is mainly
related to the air filling factor (d/Λ), that is, the range of zero-dispersion
wavelength reduces with the decreasing of d/Λ. Besides, the zero-dis-
persion wavelength appears blue-shifted and the range of the zero-
dispersion wavelength gradually increases with the increasing of D. As
we can see from Fig. 5 that two zero-dispersion wavelengths appear in
the infrared band, one of which emerges near the wavelength of
1.55 μm.
From the analysis above, under optimized geometrical parameters
conditions, the birefringence would reach a maximum at the wave-
length of 1.55 μm, and a broad zero-dispersion wavelength range would
be obtained. In order to obtain high birefringence and desired
E. Wang, et al.
Fig. 4. The change of Im(neff) and the mode field with the wavelength under Λ = 1.5 μm, d = 0.6 μm, D = 1 μm, (a) The Im(neff) for X/Y polarization, (b) the mode
field for different wavelengths.
dispersion characteristics, a lot of numerical calculations have been
done. The optimal geometrical parameters are set as D = 0.9 μm,
d = 0.8 μm and Λ = 1 μm. In order to investigate the transmission
mode of the PCF, the normalized frequency V(λ) of the PCF is calcu-
lated. The criterion for a single-mode transmission is V(λ) < π [29].
When the geometrical parameters are set as D = 0.9 μm, d = 0.8 μm
and Λ = 1 μm, the values of parameter V for different operating wa-
velengths are shown in Fig. 6(a). It is clear that the value of V is always
less than π when the wavelength is large than 1.27 μm. Therefore, it
ensures single-mode behavior for the interested wavelengths range.
Besides, its optical characteristics are shown in Fig. 6(b). It can be found
that the mode birefringence is high to 2.28 × 10−2 at the wavelength
of 1.55 μm, and two zero-dispersion wavelength points appear in the
infrared band, one of which emerges near the wavelength of 1.55 μm.
4
Optical Fiber Technology 58 (2020) 102309
The compared results of this article and the other literatures are shown
in Table 1. It can be found that the proposed PCF has certain advantages
in fabrication feasibility, birefringence value and the dispersion char-
acteristics.
It is very important to be able to fabricate the PCF proposed in this
work. By now, PCFs with different structures have been fabricated by
stack-and-draw technique. The fabrication process of the proposed PCF
mainly includes the following parts. Firstly, the quartz rods were drilled
and polished, and they were drawn into small air tubes when the
temperature of the fiber drawing tower is reach to 1900 °C. Secondly,
the air tubes were arranged according to the designed PCF structure,
that is the fabrication of the fiber preform. The preform was drawn in
the fiber drawing tower for the second time. Due to the reducing of the
spacing between the air tubes in this drawing process, the drawing
E. Wang, et al. Optical Fiber Technology 58 (2020) 102309

Fig. 5. Dispersion of different geometrical parameters, (a) hole-pitch D = 1 μm, d = 0.8 μm; (b) cladding hole diameter Λ = 1.5 μm, D = 1 μm; (c) big hole diameter
Λ = 1.5 μm, d = 0.6 μm.

Fig. 6. Fiber characteristics under D = 0.9 μm, d = 0.8 μm and Λ = 1 μm, (a) V(λ), (b) mode birefringence and dispersions.

Table 1
The results of this article and the literature.
Reference Cladding structure B Number of zero-dispersion Wavelength range of zero-dispersion

−2
Ref. [6,8] All elliptical air holes order of 10 – –
Refd. [10,16,23] Elliptical and circular air holes order of 10−2 – –
Ref. [24] Elliptical and circular air holes order of 10−2 – –
Ref. [25] Elliptical and circular air holes order of 10−3 2 700 nm
Ref. [17] All circular air holes – 2 –
Ref. [18] All circular air holes 1.918 × 10−2 1 –
Ref. [19] All circular air holes – 2 337 nm
Ref. [20] All circular air holes – 2 170 nm
Ref. [21] All circular air holes 2.34 × 10−2 – –
Ref. [22] All circular air holes 1.92 × 10−2 – –
This paper All circular air holes 2.28 × 10−2 2 741 nm

Note: The symbol '–' indicates this item is not involved in the research.

5
E. Wang, et al.
speed and the temperature must be controlled precisely. Finally, the
designed PCF was fabricated after drawing the fiber preform obtained
in the previous process.
4. Conclusions
To summarize this paper, it proposed a type of air-silica TIR-PCFs
with all circular air holes, and its optical characteristics are numerically
investigated. After the fiber structure parameters are determined, the
maximum birefringence value can be theoretically obtained, but there
is no correspondence between the maximum birefringence value and
the zero-dispersion wavelength point. Besides, when the geometrical
parameters are set to be D = 0.9 μm, d = 0.8 μm and Λ = 1 μm, its
birefringence is high to 2.28 × 10−2 at the wavelength of 1.55 μm.
And, there are two zero-dispersion wavelength points, one of which
emerges near the wavelength of 1.55 μm. The proposed PCF may show
some important applications in polarization maintaining fibers, dis-
persion management, super-continuum generation.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Erlei Wang: Investigation, Data curation, Writing - original draft,
Funding acquisition. Peng Cheng: Formal analysis, Writing - review &
editing. Weining Zhao: Writing - review & editing, Formal analysis. Jia
Li: Formal analysis. Qing Han: Writing - review & editing. Xiaodong
Zhou: Writing - review & editing.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influ-
ence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported in part by the High Level Research Start-
up Fund of ZhouKou Normal University (No. ZKNUC2017033), the Key
Scientific Research project of colleges and universities in Henan pro-
vince (No. 20A416008 and No. 20B416004) and the National Natural
Science Foundation of China (grant No.11847112).
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