C band single pump photonic crystal fiber Raman amplifier

A novel twin-core photonic crystal fiber was proposed to reduce the complexity and cost of fiber Raman amplifiers. By means of a proper design, this fiber could acquire a higher and flatter Raman gain efficiency coefficient curve r (R)=g (R)/A (eff) over a specified band of wavelength than a conventional fiber. A Raman amplifier was designed with this novel twin-core photonic crystal fiber to operate in C band from 1530 nm to 1565 nm. A remarkable improvement over a conventional fiber Raman amplifier was obtained. It was numerically demonstrated that when pumped with a single source, an average gain of 8.7 dB with a fluctuation of less than 0.9 dB is achievable.