Abstract

Standard optical fibers exhibit a figure-of-merit (nonlinearity-to-absorption ratio) that is superior to other nonlinear media.¹ However, the weak χ⁽³⁾ of glass necessitates the use of long fiber lengths for achieving meaningful nonlinear effects, making fiber-based devices cumbersome to use in practical applications. Recent advances in microstructure fiber (MF) technology^2–4 promise to change this by providing tighter light confinement for the same figure-of-merit and many concepts have already been demonstrated.^5,6 In addition, the control of geometrical degrees of freedom available during fabrication of MFs would allow researchers to greater advantage of the nonlinearity for useful applications.

© 2002 Optical Society of America