Supercontinuum generation in highly nonlinear hexagonal photonic crystal fiber at very low power

We present the design of a photonic crystal fiber which promises to yield very large optical nonlinearity similar to 151 W-1 km(-1) at 1.55 mu m wavelength. The fiber possesses two zero dispersion points whose locations can be tuned by varying the air hole diameter and hole pitch. The fiber dispersion is anomalous between these two zero dispersion points and its value is moderate. The fiber has been used to numerically simulate optical supercontinuum (SC) generation using low power pump pulses of 50 fs duration at a 1.55-mu m wavelength. At the end of 15-cm fiber, SC broadening of about 1200 and 1700 nm can be achieved with pulses of 1 and 5 kW peak power, respectively. (C) 2015 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)