Photonic crystal fiber Mach-Zehnder interferometer with microholes ablated by a femtosecond laser for refractive index sensing

A new structure of the photonic crystal fiber（PCF）based Mach-Zednder interferometer（MZI）is fabricated and presented.The structure has microholes ablated by a femtosecond laser.The fringe visibility can be enhanced more than 10 dB compared with the interferometer without a microhole.The interferometer is characterized by sodium chloride solutions for refractive index（RI）sensing.The RI sensitivities are greatly increased by the hole fabrication since it directly changes the cladding modes of the PCF.For the interferometer sensor with two holes,the RI sensitivity is 157.74 nm/RIU,which is 5 times than that of the sensor without a microhole.Microholes ablation with a femtosecond laser on PCF can increase the sensor＇s sensitivity dramatically.Femtosecond laser has a wide application prospect in the field of performance improvement of the sensors.

氢氟酸填充腐蚀方法在光子晶体光纤制造中的应用

提出一种研制光子晶体光纤(PCF)的氢氟酸填充腐蚀新方法。该方法将氢氟酸填充于已拉制的光子晶体光纤空气孔中,通过改变其横截面结构,研制具有特定结构的光子晶体光纤,改变其导光性能。研究表明,随着对光子晶体光纤空气孔腐蚀程度的加深,其泄露损耗和散射损耗不断减小,非线性系数明显提高,纤芯基模的有效折射率和包层的等效折射率相应减小,群速度色散也随之改变。