A Design Approach for a Homogeneous Hole-Assisted Multi-Core Fiber Through Hole-Allocation Around the Central Core for Minimizing Crosstalk

In this paper, a new design of seven-core hole-assisted multi-core fiber with surrounding each core is presented. Here, the holes are assumed to be filled with materials having very low refractive index contrast with cladding. Coupling of light from the central core to the outer cores of seven-core structure is investigated by rotating the holes in the range +30° to −30° around the central core. The optimum range of angles for which coupling is very low is estimated for different values of core-pitch. An average value of crosstalk and power penalty are then calculated from the minimum coupling region for core pitch $40~\mu \text{m}$ to $45~\mu \text{m}$ where crosstalk goes below the threshold limit (which is taken as −30dB). An analytical model has also been developed based on proposed design and the results are seen to be in good agreement with the results from simulation. The proposed optimum design is extremely helpful for enhancing the capacity and efficiency of Space division multiplexing based applications with low crosstalk and power penalty.