Functionalisation of optical fibres by the integration of 2D transition metal dichalcogenide materials

Abstract

In this thesis, the concept of functionalising microstructured optical fibres is proposed using a unique and novel concept of liquid phase deposition of two dimensional materials. Two fields of research have been analysed in this work. Firstly, the concept of thermal poling – whereby centrosymmetric materials with negligible values of second order nonlinearity are heated under the presence of an electrical field to break the centrosymmetry of the structure and generate a non-zero second order nonlinearity (SON) – is analysed. This quadratic nonlinearity can potentially be augmented via the insertion of intrinsically highly nonlinear 2D materials such as Transition Metal Dichalcogenides. Another area of research has been functionalising the hollow regions of antiresonant optical fibres. This is a relatively new design of fibre, whereby light is guided in a hollow core using a guidance mechanism known as inhibited coupling. The hollow regions of an anti-resonant fibre (ARF) offer an excellent template for the deposition of functional materials such as 2D films. When the optical properties of such materials can be modified via external stimuli, it offers a method to modify the transmission capability of the optical fibre. We successfully demonstrate electro-optical control on the devices, showing loss of 3dB in the guidance regions. Following on from these results, other materials were also investigated for their electro-optic properties including ZnSe in its bulk form and compared with the performance of the 2D materials.

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ORCID for Pier-John Sazio: orcid.org/0000-0002-6506-9266

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