Finite element modelling of photonic crystal fibres

Photonic crystal fibre (PCF), a new kind of optical fibre, has many air-holes in their cross-section and has potential applications to new optical communication systems. The main objective of this research is the modelling of photonic crystal fibre to identify the fundamental and higher order quasi-TE and TM modes with square, ,rectangular and circular air holes in a square and hexagonal matrix, by using a rigorous full-vectorial H-field based finite element method (FEM). Besides the modal solutions of the effective indices, mode field profiles, spot sizes, modal hybridness, polarization beat length and group velocity dispersion values for equal and unequal air holes; research was carried out to optimize and design highly birefringent PCF. The variation of modal birefringence is shown through the effect of hole diameters, air hole arrangement, structural asymmetry, operating wavelength, and pitch-distance. Birefringence was enhanced by breaking the structural symmetry and this was verified by using unequal air holes. The diameter of two air holes and four air holes in the first ring was changed to break the rotational symmetry and a comparison between the two designs is made in this work. In this work, highly birefringent PCF is designed with higher operating wavelength, larger d2/A value, lower pitch length for a given structural asymmetry. It is identified that birefringence value increases rapidly when d2 is much larger than d. At lower pitch value, one of the highest birefringence values reported so far at wavelertgth of 1.55 J.Jm for an asymmetric PCF using circular air holes. A single polarization guide PCF structure is also achieved. In this study, it has been identified that for fixed d/A and d2/A value, as operating wavelength is increased, birefringence increases significantly. It can also be identified that for higher d/A values, birefringence changes rapidly with A as their corresponding cutoff condition also approaches. One important validation of this work is the existence of modal birefringence for PCF with six-fold rotational symmetry. It is shown that birefringence value of a simple PCF incorporating circular holes but of different diameters is high compared to polarization maintaining Panda or Bow-tie fibres. This research also aims to investigate the modal leakage losses of PCF, by using a semi-vectorial beam propagation method (BPM) based on the versatile FEM. The robust perfectly matched layer (PML) boundary condition has been introduced to the modal solution approach. The effects of d2/A, operating wavelength and number of air holes have been thoroughly detailed and explained. In this study, it has been identified that the confinement loss decreases significantly with the increased number of rings, lower operating wavelength and lower d2/A value. For special case, PCF with large spot-size provides higher leakage loss.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo