Effects of Birefringence and Nonlinearity on Optical Pulse Propagation in New Types of Optical Fibers

The purpose of this grant was to allow us to complete work that we had already begun on spun optical fibers and to begin studies of holey and photonic crystal optical fibers. The work on spun optical fibers was completed with great success. It led to several publications in collaboration with our co-workers at the Universita di Padova, and the student who carried out this work received a major award from the Universita di Padova. The work on holey and photonic crystal fibers has proceeded more slowly, but, in collaboration with Korean co-workers at the Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology, we have developed three different computational models that allow us to calculate the modes of these fibers: a Galerkin model, a plane wave model, and a multipole model. We have applied these models to the study of mode coupling in periodic gratings. In collaboration with scientists at the Naval Research Laboratory, we have also applied these models to the study of pulse compression in tapered fibers and the development of nonlinear fibers that are capable of handling large powers in high-index and chalcogenide glasses. European and Asian countries have made large investments in the development of these new glass technologies, while the United States has not. As a consequence, the United States is falling behind in what we believe will prove to be a critical area of nanotechnology. It is our view that by investing in this project, the Department of Energy has helped lay the groundwork for future development of special fiber technology in the United States, once the decision has been made that the United States cannot continue to stand on the sidelines as this technology--which appears to have great commercial and military value--is developed elsewhere