Interaction of supercontinuum and Raman solitons with microstructure fiber gratings

Abstract

We investigate the interaction of visible supercontinuum light with fiber Bragg gratings that are UV-written in a birefringent air-silica microstructure fiber. Spectral enhancements near the grating resonance are observed, and their variations are studied by adjusting the power level and polarization of input pulses. With weak input pulses (<0.5nJ), individual Raman solitons are observed in the spectrum, and the grating generates a picosecond dispersive wave centered near its bandgap when a Raman soliton has both spatial and spectral overlap with the grating resonance. Using the nonlinear Schrödinger equation (NLSE) with a simplified model of the grating dispersion, our numerical modeling reproduces the salient features of this enhancement, and shows the important role played by grating dispersion outside the bandgap.