Design of air-guiding modified honeycomb photonic band-gap fibers for effectively single-mode operation

We investigate photonic band-gap (PBG) profiles of a modified honeycomb lattice structure and we identify the structural parameters that possess the largest band-gap. By incorporating the identified profile into the cladding, the wavelength dependence of the dispersion properties and confinement losses of air-guiding modified honeycomb PBG fibers (PBGFs) is investigated through a full-vector modal solver based on finite element method. In particular, we find that broadband effectively single-mode operation from 1450 nm to 1850 nm can be achieved using a modified honeycomb PBGF with a defected core realized by removing 7 air holes. (c) 2006 Optical Society of America.