Slot Spiral Silicon Photonic Crystal Fiber

With Property of Both High Birefringence

and High Nonlinearity
Volume 6, Number 3, June 2014

Tianye Huang, Member, IEEE

Jianfei Liao
Songnian Fu
M. Tang, Senior Member, IEEE
P. Shum, Senior Member, IEEE
Deming Liu

DOI: 10.1109/JPHOT.2014.2323312
1943-0655 Ó 2014 IEEE
IEEE Photonics Journal PCF With High Birefringence and Nonlinearity

Slot Spiral Silicon Photonic Crystal Fiber

With Property of Both High Birefringence
and High Nonlinearity
Tianye Huang,1;2 Member, IEEE, Jianfei Liao, 1
Songnian Fu, 1;2 M. Tang,1;2 Senior Member, IEEE,
P. Shum,3 Senior Member, IEEE, and Deming Liu 2

1
Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology,
Wuhan 430074, China
2
National Engineering Laboratory of Next Generation Internet Access Networks (NEL-NGIAS),
School of Optical and Electronic Information, Huazhong University of Science and Technology,
Wuhan 430074, China
3
School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 637553

DOI: 10.1109/JPHOT.2014.2323312
1943-0655 Ó 2014 IEEE. Translations and content mining are permitted for academic research only.
Personal use is also permitted, but republication/redistribution requires IEEE permission.
See http://www.ieee.org/publications_standards/publications/rights/index.html for more information.

Manuscript received March 31, 2014; revised May 5, 2014; accepted May 6, 2014. Date of publication
May 13, 2014; date of current version May 23, 2014. This work was supported by the National Basic
Research Program of China (973 Program) under Grant 2010CB328302, by the 863 High Technology
Plan under Grant 2012AA011301, by the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation founded project
under Grant 2013M531690, and by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant
61275069. Corresponding author: S. Fu (e-mail: songnian@mail.hust.edu.cn).

Abstract: A photonic crystal fiber (PCF) made of silicon is proposed and numerically
optimized with both ultrahigh birefringence and nonlinearity. By introducing an elliptical low-
index slot in the core region, one of the orthogonally polarized fundamental modes can be
confined in the low-index region due to the discontinuity of its electric field at the interface of
the slot and the surrounding material, while the other fundamental mode is dominated by the
modified total internal reflection (MTIR) induced by air holes of the cladding, leading to a
birefringence as high as 101 order. On the other hand, benefiting from the tight field
confinement and highly nonlinear material, nonlinear coefficients up to 1068 W1  m1 and
162 W1  m1 can be achieved for the slot mode and the MTIR mode, respectively.

Index Terms: Fiber design and fabrication, photonic crystal fibers, fiber properties, fiber
optics communications.

1. Introduction
In contrast with conventional optical fibers, photonic crystal fibers (PCF) present a diversity of new
and improved features, which provide several new applications such as nonlinear fiber optics, fiber
lasers, supercontinuum generation, and fiber sensors. In many applications of all-optical signal
processing, optical fibers with both high birefringence and high nonlinearity are desired, because
many nonlinear effects in optical fiber are polarization-sensitive, and maintaining the state of
polarization (SOP) is essential for good performance. In particular, with enhanced nonlinearity, both
the footprint and power-consumption of optical device can be reduced. By carefully arranging the air
holes of PCF, high birefringence in excess of 103 can be readily achieved [1], [2]. Even higher
birefringence up to 102 was also reported by the employment of PCF with modified rectangular
lattice [3], spiral lattice to form an elliptical core shape [4], elliptical air holes within the fiber [5], [6] or

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IEEE Photonics Journal PCF With High Birefringence and Nonlinearity

Fig. 1. Cross-section view of the proposed PCF.

soft glass with liquid crystal core [7]. Generally, breaking the symmetrical geometries of the fiber
structure or inducing build-in stress in fiber are two approaches to achieve high birefringent.
However, in most of the PCF design, the two orthogonally polarized modes are still mainly distributed
in the same region leading to small effective index difference (in the order of 102 or less). On the
other hand, highly nonlinear PCF can be accomplished by use of optimized fiber structure and
materials with high nonlinear refractive indices [6]–[10]. So far, reducing the mode field area and
employing materials with high nonlinearity are two promising methods to increase fiber nonlinearity.
The challenge lies in the fact that the intensity of the field is difficult to be confined efficiently within the
fiber core with sub-wavelength scale.
Recently, silicon PCFs or silicon core optical fibers have attracted much attention as a
complementary platform to make use of the material compatible with conventional fiber structures
[11]–[16]. Additionally, because of silicon’s large third-order susceptibility and high refractive index,
optimizing the structure to achieve high birefringence together with high nonlinearity is possible [15],
[16]. In this paper, inspired by the configuration of slot-waveguide [17], which is able to guide and
confine light in a nano-scale low index material sandwiched between two high index materials and
with an aim to achieve ultrahigh birefringence together with high nonlinearity, we propose a PCF
design by embedding an low index elliptical slot rod in the silicon core region, surrounded by spirally
arranged and gradually enlarged air holes as cladding. In such configuration, one of the orthogonally
polarized modes is dominated by the above-mentioned slot effect and can be confined in the low
index region to a large extent, while the other one is spread in the whole core region formed by both
low and high index materials, resulting in ultrahigh birefringence up to 101 order which is the highest
value ever reported, to the best of our knowledge. Meanwhile, benefiting from the tight mode
confinement and highly nonlinear material, the proposed PCF demonstrates ultrahigh nonlinear
coefficient as well.

2. Fiber Design
The general structure of the proposed silicon PCF is demonstrated in Fig. 1. The silicon PCF
(Si-PCF) consists of spiral lattice without central air to form the core region. It has 6 arms and the air
holes of each arm form a single spiral of radius r with equal angular increment . The diameter of the
air holes from innermost to outermost (D1 , D2 , D3 , and D4 ) is gradually enlarged to ensure good
mode confinement, and the distance from fiber center to each air hole layer is r , 2r , 3r , and 4r . In
order to form slot region in fiber, an elliptical rod (with minor semi-axis length a and major semi-axis
length b) composed of low index silicon nano-crystals (Si-nc) is embedded in the center of core
region. This elliptical rod significantly breaks the symmetry of the fiber leading to ultrahigh
birefringence since a large fraction of quasi-TM mode can be confined within the low index rod. In

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IEEE Photonics Journal PCF With High Birefringence and Nonlinearity

Fig. 2. Mode profiles of the fundamental quasi-TM (slot mode) and quasi-TE (MTIR mode) at 1550 nm
with major semi-axis b horizontally aligned. (a ¼ 30 nm, b ¼ 200 nm, r ¼ 400 nm,  ¼ 30 ,
D1 ¼ 360 nm, D2 ¼ 520 nm, D3 ¼ 680 nm, and D4 ¼ 840 nm).

particular, because of the field enhancement of quasi-TM mode, high nonlinearity can also be
obtained. Though the basic principle of slot effect is still total internal reflection [18], in order to
separate these two orthogonally-polarized modes in the following discussion, we name these two as
slot mode and modified total internal reflection (MTIR) mode, respectively.
Using a full-vector finite element method (FEM) simulator (COMSOL. Multiphysics) with element
size of 5 nm in the core region, the mode profiles of quasi-TM (vertical polarized slot mode) and
quasi-TE (horizontal polarized MTIR mode) can be calculated. With the following parameters
r ¼ 400 nm,  ¼ 30 , D1 ¼ 360 nm, D2 ¼ 520 nm, D3 ¼ 680 nm, D4 ¼ 840 nm, a ¼ 60 nm, and
b ¼ 400 nm, the mode profiles of the two modes at 1550 nm are demonstrated in Fig. 2. The
refractive indices of silicon and Si-nc are obtained from Sellmeier functions [19], [20]. Apparently,
quasi-TM mode is well confined in the low index slot region because of the discontinuity of electric
field vector at the high-index-contrast interface of Si-nc and silicon. This discontinuity makes the field
more intense in the low-index rod region compared with quasi-TE mode whose electric field is spread
within the core region. The effective reflective index of slot mode and MTIR mode are 2.30993 and
2.55879, respectively, indicating an ultrahigh birefringence of 0.24886, which is significantly higher
than the previously reported highly birefringent fibers [1]–[6]. On the other hand, in our proposed
fiber, a large portion of the slot mode can be confined within the low index but highly nonlinear
elliptical rod. Therefore, the nonlinearity can be extremely high. Using the nonlinear refractive index
of 4:8  1017 m2 =w of Si-nc and 5  1018 m2 =w of Silicon [21], [22] and following the full vector
model [23], the nonlinear coefficients of the slot and MTIR mode are calculated to be 1068 W1 m1
and 162 W1 m1 , respectively, where the nonlinear coefficients is much higher than the values
reported in [4], [7]–[10], [16]. Therefore, the proposed PCF is suitable for all-optical signal processing
within a compact configuration.

3. Discussion
To further investigate the influence of slot geometry parameters, the impacts of a and b on the fiber
birefringence are analyzed at a wavelength range from 1.5 m to 1.6 m. As shown in Fig. 3, the fiber
birefringence is varied with respect to the length of a and b under a range of a ¼ 30 nm and
b ¼ 200 nm, respectively. It can be found from Fig. 3(a) that the birefringence increases as b
increases with fixed a, because the fiber cross-section is rotationally asymmetric. Especially, the
birefringence is almost flat within the wavelength range. In Fig. 3(b), it is shown that the fiber
birefringence increases with parameter a firstly. However, if a is larger than 35 nm, further increasing a
contributes oppositely to the birefringence enhancement. This may be attributed to that when a is
small, slot effect dominates the mode field distribution. However, further increasing a significantly
weakens the field enhancement offered by the slot effect, therefore decreasing the fiber birefringence.

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IEEE Photonics Journal PCF With High Birefringence and Nonlinearity

Fig. 3. Birefringence variation with respect to (a) major semi-axis b with a ¼ 30 nm and (b) minor semi-
axis a with b ¼ 200 nm when b is aligned horizontally.

Fig. 4. Mode profiles of the fundamental quasi-TE (slot mode) and quasi-TM (MTIR mode) at 1550 nm
with major semi-axis b vertically aligned. (a ¼ 30 nm, b ¼ 200 nm, r ¼ 400 nm,  ¼ 30 , D1 ¼ 360 nm,
D2 ¼ 520 nm, D3 ¼ 680 nm, and D4 ¼ 840 nm).

It should be noted that the quasi-TM slot mode is supported in the proposed PCF. However, once
the major semi-axis b is rotated to be vertical, quasi-TE slot mode becomes the polarized slot mode,
as shown in Fig. 4.
For a comparison, the influence of the slot geometry parameters is also investigated in Fig. 5. It is
found that the impacts of a and b on birefringence show similar characteristics, compared with the
structure with slot region aligned horizontally. It should be noted that, in this structure, major semi-
axis length b can be longer than that of the former one, because of the two gaps between air holes
along the vertical direction. Within the range from 80 nm to 240 nm, higher birefringence can be
obtained by increasing b. However, birefringence benefits little from further increment of b. For
example, with b ¼ 280 nm, the birefringence is even smaller than the value with b ¼ 240 nm, as
shown in Fig. 5(a). Overall, the birefringence values obtained in this structure are smaller than those
in the one with major semi-axis horizontally aligned. For example, with a ¼ 30 nm and b ¼ 200 nm,
the index difference between quasi-TE mode and quasi-TM mode is 0.21870 which is smaller than
the above-mentioned 0.24886 in the horizontally-aligned structure. Nevertheless, this value is still
much higher than the previously reported results [1]–[7].
Benefiting from highly nonlinear material and tight mode confinement, high nonlinearity is another
feature of the proposed PCF. It can be found in Fig. 6(a), when b is fixed to be 200 nm, the
nonlinearity of MTIR mode is nearly unchanged with different a, while the nonlinearity of slot mode

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IEEE Photonics Journal PCF With High Birefringence and Nonlinearity

Fig. 5. Birefringence variation with respect to (a) major semi-axis b with a ¼ 30 nm and (b) minor semi-
axis a with b ¼ 200 nm when b is aligned vertically.

Fig. 6. Nonlinearity variation of TIR mode and slot mode with respect to the length of (a) minor semi-axis
and (b) major semi-axis. Confinement factors of Si-nc region and air region for slot modes with respect
to the length of (c) minor semi-axis and (d) major semi-axis.

goes down with increased a. According to the confinement factors of Si-nc and air regions for slot
mode [24], as shown in Fig. 6(c), increasing a weakens the mode confinement capability of slot
region and enhances the fields in air holes as a result of the drastically degraded nonlinearity. The
influence of b ða ¼ 30 nmÞ is illustrated in Fig. 6(b). Nonlinear coefficients of MTIR mode goes down
slightly with increased b. For slot mode, it can be found in Fig. 6(d), both Sinc and air increase
with b. When b is less than 180 nm, Sinc changes faster than air , leading to a nonlinearity
enhancement. However, further increasing b slows down the variation rate of Sinc and speeds up
air as a result of the weakened nonlinearity of slot mode, as shown in Fig. 6(b). With properly chosen

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IEEE Photonics Journal PCF With High Birefringence and Nonlinearity

parameter, the maximum nonlinear coefficient can be achieved in the proposed PCF to be as high as
1731 W1 m1 . Note that the maximum values of birefringence and nonlinear coefficient cannot be
obtained simultaneously, compromising these two values needed for specific applications.
Nevertheless, simultaneously obtaining 101 order birefringence together with  103 W1 m1 order
nonlinear coefficients of slot mode can be achieved in the proposed PCF. Compared with the
previous work for simultaneously realizing high birefringence and nonlinearity [4], [6], [7], both values
for these parameters are excellent.
Based on the recent achievements in silicon fiber fabrication techniques [11]–[15], silica PCF with
an elliptical air hole in the core region can be prepared firstly in order to fabricate the proposed PCF
[25]. Then magnesiothermic reduction technique is applied to convert silica PCF to silicon PCF [11].
Finally, modified chemical vapor deposition (MCVD) method is used to deposit Si-nc in the elliptical
air hole to form the proposed PCF [26]. The origin of loss for the proposed PCF arise from various
mechanisms that fall into three categories namely, absorption loss, confine loss, and scattering
loss. The extinction coefficient k of Si-nc is less than 105 [27], while by applying a perfectly
matched layer (PML), the calculated imaginary part of the slot mode is at the order of 105
indicating a loss of 4 dB/cm. However, this value can be further reduced by employing more air
hole layers. The scattering loss is mainly determined by the surface roughness which can be
mitigated with the improved fabrication techniques. Note that fabricated silicon core fiber with loss
around 5 dB/cm is possible already [13]. Therefore, with such high nonlinearity, it is reasonable to
believe that the proposed silicon PCF can be a promising candidate to realize all-optical signal
processing in mm-scale length [22].

4. Conclusion
In summary, we have proposed a silicon PCF with ultrahigh birefringence and nonlinearity by
employing an elliptical slot in the center of fiber core. Benefiting from the slot effect, either quasi-TM
or quasi-TE mode can be confined in the low index slot rod, while the other fundamental mode is
spread in both low and high index region leading to ultrahigh birefringence up to 101 order. On the
other hand, due to the tight field confinement and highly nonlinear material, the nonlinear coefficient
of the slot mode is as high as 103 order W1 m1 . The proposed silicon PCF has the potential to
realize all-optical signal processing within ultra-compact devices.

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