Abstract
We report here the combined study of air/silica surface roughness and
light scattering in a microstructured optical fiber designed for non-linear
operation. Side polishing of the fiber gave access to the surface of the holes,
and allowed measurements of their roughness by atomic force microscopy. The
observed roughness topography, not reported in such fibers until now, consists
of a rather regular arrangement of shallow patterns with lateral size in the
micron range and amplitude in the 10 nm range. By comparing measured angle-resolved
scattering patterns to coupled-mode calculations, we show that roughness-induced
scattering loss can be linked to both the roughness and the overlap of fundamental
with radiative modes at the air/silica interfaces. The reduction of surface
roughness amplitude down to the thermodynamic limit could permit to strongly
decrease the threshold of Raman fiber lasers.
© 2009 IEEE
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