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Randomly coupled trench-assisted multicore fibers with different arrangements for high tolerance of manufacturing errors

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Abstract

Randomly coupled multicore fibers (RC-MCFs) are promising candidates for long-haul transmission. However, the degree of coupling between the homogeneous cores of an RC-MCF is weakened if manufacturing errors appear. Therefore, a low-index trench layer is introduced into the coupled cores to investigate the effects of its position and thickness on the group index to enhance the tolerance of manufacturing errors. A depressed region is designed in the center of the core to solve the problem of the effective area decreasing because of the confinement of the low-index trench. Additionally, it is important to study the effective arrangement of the coupled cores to obtain a smaller group delay spread (GDS) within the limited 125-µm cladding; we discuss the single-layer and double-layer arrangements. A moderate range is found for both the bending radius and core pitch to minimize the GDS. For the single-layer arrangement, the degree of mixing is weak, and the degeneracy state does not easily change the bending conditions; thus, it may be a good candidate for designing systemically coupled multicore fibers. For the double-layer arrangement, the bending and twisting factors can induce sufficient mixing among the different modes to reduce GDS; thus, this arrangement is more suitable for the design of RC-MCFs.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by National Key Research and Development Program of China (Grant No. 2021YFB2800901), National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. U2001601, 62035018), Guangzhou Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation (Grant No. 202002030327), and Guangdong Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation (Grant No. 2023A1515012984).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electronic Engineering, College of Information Science and Technology, Jinan University, Guangzhou, 510632, China

    Yongneng Jiang, Jiajing Tu, Shecheng Gao & Weiping Liu

  2. School of Electronics and Information Technology, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Information Processing Chips and Systems, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, 510006, China

    Zhaohui Li

  3. Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Zhuhai), Zhuhai, 519082, China

    Zhaohui Li

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  1. Yongneng Jiang
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  2. Jiajing Tu
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Correspondence to Jiajing Tu.

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Jiang, Y., Tu, J., Gao, S. et al. Randomly coupled trench-assisted multicore fibers with different arrangements for high tolerance of manufacturing errors. Sci. China Inf. Sci. 66, 212302 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11432-022-3709-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11432-022-3709-y

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