Tapered fibers embedded in silica aerogel.
We have embedded thin tapered fibers (with diameters down to 1 microm) in silica aerogel with low loss. The aerogel is rigid but behaves refractively like air, protecting the taper without disturbing light propagation along it. This enables a new class of fiber devices exploiting volume evanescent interactions with the aerogel itself or with dopants or gases in the pores.
Xiao
Limin
L
Centre for Photonics and Photonics Materials, Department of Physics, University of Bath, Bath BA2 7AY, UK. L.Xiao@bath.ac.uk
Grogan
Michael D W
MD
Leon-Saval
Sergio G
SG
Williams
Rhys
R
England
Richard
R
Wadsworth
Willam J
WJ
Birks
Tim A
TA