Theoretical and experimental analysis of splicing between the photonic crystal fiber and the conventional fiber using grin fibers

Photonic crystal fibers (PCFs) are widely used in all-fiber, high-power lasers and supercontinuum sources. However, the splice loss between PCFs and conventional fibers limits its development. Grin fibers and coreless fibers were used as a fiber lens to achieve low-loss, high-strength splicing between PCFs and single-mode fibers (SMFs). The beam propagation method was used to optimize the lengths of grin fibers and coreless fibers for a minimum splice loss. The splice loss changing with the lengths of grin fiber, coreless fiber, and the air-hole collapsed region was systematically studied theoretically and experimentally. Ultimately, a minimum splice loss of 0.26 dB at 1064 nm was realized between a high-nonlinear PCF and a conventional SMF with this method. (C) 2012 Optical Society of America