INSTITUTE OF PHYSICS PUBLISHING MEASUREMENT SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Meas. Sci. Technol. 15 (2004) 1120–1128 PII: S0957-0233(04)75385-0

Microstructure fibres for optical sensing

in gases and liquids
John M Fini
OFS Laboratories, Murray Hill, NJ, 07302, USA
E-mail: fini@ofsoptics.com

Received 16 January 2004, in final form 11 March 2004

Published 13 May 2004
Online at stacks.iop.org/MST/15/1120
DOI: 10.1088/0957-0233/15/6/011

Abstract
A novel water-core microstructure fibre design allows nearly ideal guidance
for aqueous sensing applications. The total internal reflection by a
microstructured silica–air cladding provides robust confinement of light in a
fluid-filled core, if the average cladding index is sufficiently below the index
of water. Numerical results show dramatically improved loss and overlap of
light with the sample, compared to evanescent-field fibres, indicating a
direct improvement of sensor performance. A strategy for the improvement
of evanescent-wave gas sensors is also discussed.
Keywords: fibre sensors, microstructure fibres, speciality fibres, optical
sensing

1. Introduction appendix provide a review of some background concepts in

optical sensing and microstructure fibre waveguides. Section 3
Microstructure optical fibres (MOFs) have been studied with looks at evanescent-field sensor fibres, proposing strategies
great interest recently, spurred on by the observation of for achieving modest improvements in their performance.
supercontinuum generation and its impact on metrology Section 4 presents the primary result of the paper, a family of
[1]. The field is developing rapidly and promises dramatic water-core fibre designs that achieve nearly ideal performance,
advances in communications fibre [2, 3] and a variety of and have significant advantages over previous designs. We
devices. expect these water-core fibres will have an immediate impact
For several years, there has been discussion on using on optical sensing, and look forward to developments in
microstructure fibres for sensing applications [4–7] such as fabrication and input/output coupling to such fibres. Similar
the detection of trace chemicals in gas or liquid samples. designs may also improve the performance of water-filled
Early proposals offer preliminary designs with little theoretical waveguides for optical power delivery [10].
or experimental evidence that sensor performance would be
enhanced by a microstructure fibre. At the same time, various 2. Specialty fibres for sensing applications
experiments provide compelling proof that light can be made
to interact with fluid samples in a controlled way [8], and that Optical sensing systems are important for a variety of
these designs should be pursued further. It has been recognized applications. In a typical optical sensor, a light source
that the common evanescent-field designs have low overlap of illuminates a sample and a signal is obtained from
light with the sample—a flaw that must be overcome to fulfil light detected in transmission, reflection, fluorescence,
the potential of microstructured sensor-fibres. This problem of etc, indicating the composition of the sample. Multiple
low overlap has also been discussed for non-fibre evanescent- wavelengths can be used for the illumination or the detection,
field waveguide sensors; in [9] overlaps (or ‘interaction ratios’) taking advantage of known spectroscopic features of the
less than 1% were calculated for a planar waveguide sensor of detected species. One configuration passes an unguided beam
aqueous dyes. of light through a bulk sample using free-space optics. In this
This paper presents improved designs of microstructure case, the fibre may play a secondary role transmitting power
fibres for sensing applications, including detailed simulations and information to and from the sensing element, but does
of guidance properties. The following section and the not interact directly with the sample. In figure 1, we depict a

0957-0233/04/061120+09$30.00 © 2004 IOP Publishing Ltd Printed in the UK 1120

 Microstructure fibres for optical sensing in gases and liquids

sample in sample out

light source detector

sample in sample out

light source detector

Figure 2. An evanescent-field microstructure fibre has holes
running along the length of a glass fibre, near the light-guiding core
region. A common cross-sectional geometry is the centre-hole
sample in sample out
omitted triangular-lattice (COT) type, shown left with holes shaded.
The optical power (right) shows evanescent fields penetrating into
the holes can interact with a gas or liquid sample for optical sensing.

source detector

Figure 1. Optical fibre can dramatically improve the sensitivity of a

sensor by increasing the interaction length between light and the
sample. In a typical bulk configuration (top), light interaction with
the sample may be limited to lengths of a few centimetres. We
present specialty fibre designs that will allow interaction of guided
light with a sample over a metre length and greater distances
(middle). Interferometric detection of light (bottom) can also be
used if mode-coupling in the waveguide can be controlled.

different kind of system, where light interacts with the sample Figure 3. Fibres with the seven-hole adjoined triangular-lattice
as it is guided along a fibre or capillary waveguide. The (SAT) geometry have been demonstrated as air-core bandgap
waveguides with low loss and good confinement to the core air
measured signal can be enhanced by using long interaction region.
lengths, difficult to achieve in bulk samples. Also shown is
an interferometric detector, which may be used to construct
and optical inputs, but many practical issues have barely been
ultra-high sensitivity detectors.
explored.
The guided-light approach is currently used in some
Air-core bandgap-fibre measurements demonstrate the
sensing systems despite the poor performance offered
basic requirements for a sensor fibre, particularly high
by traditional low-index-core optical waveguides. These
overlap with a gas sample [3, 12]. These designs use a
waveguides face a difficult material problem: metal
microstructured cladding but with a large central hole in the
waveguides have high loss at optical wavelengths, but index
core, for example the seven-hole adjoined triangular-lattice
guiding (or total-internal reflection (TIR)) requires a ‘cladding’
(SAT) geometry of figure 3. While bandgap fibres are an
material with lower index than the gas or liquid sample.
interesting possibility for sensing and other applications, they
Waveguides based on fluid-filled capillaries or glass (non-
come along with fabrication difficulties, and are generally less
microstructured) fibres inevitably suffer high loss or low
robust than index-guided MOF. Below, we show that a novel
overlap of the field with the sample, or achieve low loss using
index-guided fibre type achieves high overlap without using
a very large-core waveguide [10, 11]. The latter possibility
bandgap guidance, and should therefore have advantages in
brings limitations due to highly multimode propagation.
manufacturability and robustness. In any case, the proposed
Microstructure fibres present novel and practical ways
index-guided watercore fibre is an interesting alternative to
around these obstacles by providing a ‘designer material’ with
evanescent-field and bandgap fibres, and should be explored
reduced index, and introducing bandgap effects. Existing
further.
designs include the evanescent-field fibre, such as shown
in figure 2, and bandgap-guided fibres. In this and other
schematic cross-sections, the shaded circles represent holes 2.1. Sensitivity, loss and overlap
that run along the length of the glass fibre. By pumping By providing low loss and high overlap, a well-designed
a sample material into the holes of such a fibre, we can water-core fibre could directly improve sensitivity and optical
bring it in contact with the guided light. The guidance power requirements of guided-light systems. While no single
mechanisms (bandgap and index-guidance) are defined in equation describes the many diverse optical sensors, the
the appendix. Unlike very-large-core waveguides [10, 11], measured signal is often roughly proportional to interaction
microstructure fibres can be designed to be single-moded, with the sample, and attenuated by the loss factor,
allowing interferometric detection and eliminating mode-
coupling problems. Incorporating any of these designs into Signal ∝ (Interaction length) × (Overlap) × e−Loss×Length .
a sensing system should simply be a matter of providing fluid (1)

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J M Fini

This may result, for example, from small-signal analysis

(relevant to the sensitivity) of an interferometric detection −1
10 5
10
or optical absorption measurement. The signal enhancement
obtained from a long interaction length is limited by the loss,
and can be cancelled if the overlap is too small.
Overlap is most simply understood as the fraction of

Loss, dB/m
4

Overlap
10
optical power that is exposed to the sample. Light in an
evanescent-field fibre is primarily confined to the glass core
(figure 2); it has little ‘overlap’ with a fluid sample in the holes,
and proportionately small detected ‘signal’. Overlap can be 3
quantified by the shift in the index neff of the guided mode, 10
d=0.1,Λ=0.6 d=0.1,Λ=0.6
which then leads to phase shifts or absorption (for imaginary −2
10 d=0.15,Λ=0.6 d=0.15,Λ=0.6
neff -shifts). A precise formulation is standard perturbation d=0.2,Λ=0.6 d=0.2,Λ=0.6
theory for guided vector fields d=0.25,Λ=0.6 d=0.25,Λ=0.6

2
10
dA |E|2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 0.4 0.6 0.8 1
δneff ≈ √
, (2)
2 0 µ0 dA R{E ∗ × H} · ẑ wavelength, microns wavelength, microns
 2 
where  =  nsample includes the index-shift and Figure 4. Overlap and loss for a family of evanescent-field silica–air
absorption of the bulk sample. Generally, a more intuitive fibres.
formula is used,
[Power in fluid]
δneff ≈ δnsample , (3)
[Total power]
which is equivalent in the limit that the modes have moderate
polarization effects.

2.2. Calculation of waveguide modes

The design of an effective fibre-optical sensor includes many
aspects, and depends on the details of the sample and sensing
environment. This paper focuses on the calculation and
Figure 5. Modified evanescent-field geometry.
design of the relevant optical properties (primarily loss and
overlap) of microstructure fibres. Single-mode or few-mode
operation may be required in some systems, particularly if 3.1. Improved evanescent-field design
interferometric detection is being used. Other issues, such as There is huge flexibility in adjusting the sizes, shapes and
getting light and fluids into the fibre, are crucial to a practical positions of the microstructure holes to optimize performance.
design, but are not discussed in detail here. The analysis uses One generalization of the evanescent-field fibre is shown in
an established numerical technique, the multipole method [13], figure 5. Rather than introducing a core defect by eliminating
to calculate characteristic modes of the fibre. These natural one hole entirely from the lattice, we use a hole of reduced
modes are defined as solutions to Maxwell’s equations which diameter, dcore /d < 1. By adding the centre hole where we
are translationally invariant, expect the fundamental mode power to be highest, we aim
E(r) = E(x, y) exp(iβz). (4) to force more of the optical power to overlap with the gas.
The mode calculation gives us the power distribution in the This design principle could be generalized to more complex
fibre cross section and the propagation constant β = neff 2π/λ, structures.
indicating the optical phase (real β) and attenuation (imaginary Simulation results of figure 6 confirm that the overlap
β) that accumulates as light propagates. of the modified design can be dramatically higher than the
corresponding solid-core structure (with dcore = 0) at a given
3. Evanescent-field fibres wavelength. But at fixed wavelength (and fixed d, ),
the modified designs give both higher overlap and higher
The design of evanescent-field fibres to maximize overlap was confinement loss, complicating the results. To make a more
discussed in [6]. Figure 4 reviews the same basic trends (for fair comparison, figure 7 replots the same results as overlap
somewhat different geometry, figure 2) with varying ratios versus loss. There, it is clear that the modified design improves
d/ of hole diameter and spacing. Generally, overlaps overlap for a fixed loss level, as well as for fixed wavelength.
are quite poor for small holes. Better penetration into the The practical impact of this strategy should be explored further.
holes is obtained for longer wavelengths and larger d/ Since these fibres are index-guided, we expect robust
[6], but only up to a point, since large λ/ comes along guidance as long as the defect is sufficiently pronounced.
with higher confinement losses. The loss plotted is for a Clearly, as dcore /d approaches 1, accidental variations
three-ring cladding, and can naturally be reduced by adding in the lattice will cause large changes in the guidance
more holes, but the trend indicates the weaker confinement properties. While these overlap improvements are interesting,
at long wavelengths. Ultimately this, along with bending the modified-evanescent design still has potential problems
or fabrication constraints, will place a limit on the available which should be investigated. For example, the centre hole
overlap. may complicate input/output coupling from standard fibre

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 Microstructure fibres for optical sensing in gases and liquids
0 6
10 10 1.45 d/Λ=0.55
silica index, 1.45
d/Λ=0.6
d/Λ=0.65
4
10 1.4 d/Λ=0.7
d/Λ=0.75

effective index, neff

2
10 1.35

Loss, dB/m
water index, 1.33
Overlap

−1
10
0
10 1.3

−2 1.25
d /d=0 10
core
dcore/d=0.5
dcore
/d=0.75
−2 −4 1.2
10 10 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5
0.6 0.8 1 1.2 0.6 0.8 1 1.2

wavelength ( µ m) wavelength ( µ m) normalized wavelength, λ/Λ

Figure 8. For high enough air-fill-fraction, the average index of a

Figure 6. Modified evanescent-field fibre overlap. silica–air cladding can drop below the index of water, allowing
index-guidance of light in a water core. The average index is here
6
10 quantified by the wavelength-dependent total-internal-reflection
edge, nTIR (λ), which crosses nwater ≈ 1.33 for all d/ greater than
around 0.54. Also shown are analytical mode line estimates
10
4 (dashed), suggesting that strong confinement of light in the water
core will require d/ values closer to 0.7.

2
10 highly multimode, very irregular output field pattern will limit
Loss, dB/m

sensor applications unless the fabrication is extremely precise.

0
10

4.1. Basic design

−2
10 d /d=0
d
core
/d=0.5 By surrounding a water core with an air–silica microstructured
core
dcore/d=0.75 cladding, it is possible to achieve robust index guidance, well
−4
10 confined to the core and with high overlap with the sample.
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7
Overlap Such structures can be designed to be many-moded, few-
moded or single-moded, as required by the measurement
Figure 7. Modified evanescent-field fibre overlap plotted versus system. This strategy can be implemented in a SAT fibre
loss. (figure 3) for example, starting from simple, approximate
design rules which follow directly from the basic waveguide
(although an adiabatic mode converter would, in theory, principles discussed in the appendix. The intuitive design
provide efficient coupling). is then followed by detailed numerical simulation using the
multipole method.
4. Water-core fibres In order to achieve robust confinement in a water core, the
‘average’ index of the air–silica cladding must be below the
We now turn to sensing in aqueous media. On the one hand, index of water, nwater ≈ 1.33. Intuitively, this average index
the basic problem is similar, and the same types of design will be low enough when the air fill fraction (proportional
can be used as for gas sensors: evanescent-field or bandgap to (d/)2 ) is high, and for sufficiently long normalized
fibres. The principles are exactly the same, but the details must wavelength λ/. The condition can be quantified using the
include the material properties of water. On the other hand, standard Bloch-wave analysis of the lattice (see, for example
since the index of water is considerably higher than that of air, [13, 14]); this gives the index nTIR (λ) above which light can
a very different kind of design is also possible: index-guidance be guided through total internal reflection, or ‘index-guidance’
in a water core using a silica–air cladding. (see also appendix). Figure 8 shows nTIR as a function
Before we discuss three-material fibres, we note a recent of λ/ for several values of d/. For simplicity material
variation on the evanescent-field fibre theme [7], based on dispersion has been neglected in this calculation: nhole = 1
index-guiding in the many glass webs of a microstructure and nsilica = 1.45. As expected, for larger holes (d/
0.54)
fibre. While the basic fibre geometry is similar to the design and long wavelength we see the basic requirement for guidance
proposed here, the absence of air from the cladding makes satisfied: the water index falls within the TIR-confinement
a large difference in guidance properties and performance. region. This requirement can be refined if we assume that
Using cladding-modes in a large-d/λ SAT geometry (similar light must be well confined to a core of appropriate size; as
to those used for air-core guidance), this work should allow discussed in the appendix, a crude mode index approximation
fairly high optical overlap, but with the disadvantage that light (A.3) is
tends to localize at any irregularities of the cladding. The n2eff,fund = n2core − 0.32(λ/Dcore )2 . (5)

1123
J M Fini

for the fundamental mode, with core diameter Dcore ≈ 2 for

a SAT geometry. Similarly, one would expect a higher-order
mode near
n2eff,HOM = n2core − 0.58(λ/Dcore )2 . (6)
The analytical mode-line estimates have been drawn in
figure 8 for fundamental and higher-order modes. From the
figure, we expect that d/
0.7 is required to obtain a
well-confined fundamental mode, and d/  0.8 is required
if a single-moded or few-moded waveguide is desired. This
suggests a range of preferred air-fill fractions as a starting point
in our design. Smaller values would have less well-confined
modes (and worse overlap and loss), and larger values may
have problems associated with multiple modes and fabrication
difficulties.
This type of fibre would offer key advantages
over evanescent-field designs. The major challenge in
implementing real sensors is to couple (simultaneously) fluids
and light into the fibre—a problem not only for this fibre class,
but for bandgap and evanescent-wave fibres as well. Because
the core hole is much larger than the cladding holes, one
will automatically achieve different fill rates using capillarity
or active pumping of fluids, allowing one to selectively
fill the core hole, or selectively plug the cladding holes.
For applications where continuous loading of the sample is
required, the simplest conceptual scheme would couple light
into the core using a lens immersed in the sample, in essentially
the same way that free-space optics are used to couple light Figure 9. The water-core fibre with air–silica cladding supports the
into standard glass fibres. For other applications, there may be desired fundamental core mode (circle), but also cladding modes
(stars) and modes guided in the glass webs surrounding the core
advantages to sealing the fibre by plugging or collapsing the (dots). Below, optical intensity profiles at λ = 1 µm are shown for
core hole before measurement. The inherent scalability of the modes representative of these three types, (b), (c) and (d ),
fibre drawing process, where the natural production lengths respectively. Losses for the web-guided modes can be small, and so
are thousands to millions of metres, raises the possibility of controlling these modes is an important part of fibre design.
fibre as an inexpensive consumable. This would have obvious
advantages regarding contamination.
cladding modes, for example by microbends, is sufficiently
small. Web modes have been discussed with respect to air-
4.2. Numerical simulation
core fibres [7], and can be problematic, in particular since they
The qualitative description is very nicely born out numerically, can have lower losses than the core modes. As we will see,
with a few complications. Figure 9(a) shows the effective it is possible to eliminate these unwanted modes, for example
index for several modes of a preliminary waveguide design. by adjusting the geometry of the core region [18].
The fibre has three rings of holes with d = 0.76 µm,  = The intensity profiles of figure 9(b)–(d ) highlight that
1 µm and one large circular core hole with diameter 2.27 µm. some modes are readily identifiable as core, cladding or web-
Material dispersion for silica and water was included in these modes, but this distinction is not always black-and-white.
and the following calculations. As expected, for wavelengths ‘Core’ modes have some power in the web and cladding
above 0.7 µm, the condition neff < nwater is satisfied and regions, and may emerge continuously from web or cladding
a mode emerges with power primarily confined to the core modes as wavelength is increased.
(shown in figure 9(b)). However, two other types of modes
appear in this waveguide, and can complicate the design: first 4.3. Reduced-web water-core fibre
there are the poorly-confined, relatively high-loss cladding
modes with neff just below the TIR region. These have power We have explored an improved design, where the glass web
distributed through the cladding region, as in figure 9(c), and around the core is perforated in order to remove unwanted
are analogous to more familiar cladding modes of standard glass-guided modes. This strategy was successful, and
fibres or solid-core microstructure fibres, discussed previously gave the essentially ideal guidance properties described in
in [15, 16]. Finally there are ‘web’ modes with power localized figures 10, 11 and 12. Circular-hole perforations were used
in the glass web near the core (figure 9(d )), similar to surface for numerical reasons, but other reduced-web geometries
modes of air-core fibres [17]. should give equivalent results, and may be chosen on the
Cladding modes are not of practical importance in the basis of manufacturability. The first two figures use  =
fibre as long as two conditions are met: they are much higher 0.9 µm, d = 0.648 µm and centre hole diameter 2.35 µm. It
loss than the confined modes (true for the simulated fibre of shows essentially single-moded behaviour, indicated by the
figure 9), and coupling between the confined modes and high cladding-mode losses and the absence of the web modes.

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 Microstructure fibres for optical sensing in gases and liquids

Figure 10. By sculpting the glass in the vicinity of the core, single-moded operation can be achieved in the index-guiding region. In the
left-hand plot, we see a single-mode line light grey in the unshaded guidance region between water index and the TIR edge. In the
right-hand plot, we see the intensity of the fundamental mode, almost completely confined to the water core of this modified SAT fibre.
Dotted lines indicate the holes.

1 few-moded designs, propagation is achieved over a wide range

5
10 of wavelengths, and at wavelengths useful for some sensing
0.8
applications. Figure 11 confirms that the fundamental core
cladding
Overlap with water core

modes mode has high overlap and much lower loss than the cladding
4
10 modes.
Loss, dB/m

0.6 Figures 10 and 12 also include (dashed) the analytical

mode-line estimates given by equations (5) and (6).
3
0.4 10 Quantitative agreement with exact results is not expected, but
the simple predictions do provide a useful, rough guideline to
0.2 fundamental guide simulations. Further, the power and field profiles for
10
2 mode core modes can easily be identified with modes of traditional
round waveguides, that is LP01 like, TM01 like, etc.
0
0.6 0.8 1 0.6 0.8 1 While some sensors rely on interaction of light directly
wavelength with the fluid sample, the most chemically selective and
sensitive sensors measure the reaction of the sample with an
Figure 11. Overlap (left) and loss (right) of the reduced-web
silica–air–water fibre are shown. As the average cladding index
indicator material, for example, bound on a surface. A highly
drops below that of water, the fundamental core mode emerges with selective biosensor could be made by coating the surface
an abrupt increase in core overlap and abrupt drop in loss. of the centre hole with a receptor, whose reaction with the
sample could be measured with high sensitivity. Higher-order
core modes in a water-core fibre may have advantages for
The design of figure 12 uses  = 1.0 µm, d = 0.76 µm such systems, since the optical power in these modes can be
and centre hole diameter 2.57 µm, and is designed to include concentrated near a glass–fluid interface, as seen in figure 12.
two groups of core modes: the fundamental and the first Coupling of light between modes of solid few-moded
higher-order-mode group. For both the single-moded and fibres has been accomplished with excellent efficiency [19],

1.36
TIR index

1.34 water index

1.32
n =β/k

1.3
eff

1.28

1.26 fundamental
first HOM group
cladding modes
1.24
0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 1.1
wavelength (µm)

Figure 12. Another SAT fibre with reduced web includes the fundamental mode and one higher-order core-mode group. This should allow
controlled coupling into modes with light concentrated at the glass–water interface. The intensity of a higher-order core mode is shown
(right).

1125
J M Fini

1 with the sample over a wide wavelength range. This fibre

5
10 would make a nearly ideal sensor waveguide, and should be
0.9
robust to fabrication imperfections.
0.8 4
10 cladding Detailed simulations for three particular water-core
modes
fibres have been presented along with qualitative design
Overlap with water core

0.7
3 rules. Using the same basic strategy, fibres can readily
10
0.6 be designed to accommodate different sample materials,

Loss, dB/m
interaction wavelengths, core sizes, etc, as required by the
0.5 2
10 details of the application.
0.4
1
0.3 10 Acknowledgments
0.2 0
10 fundamental I thank Ryan Bise, Jeff Nicholson, Dennis Trevor, Samir
0.1 mode Ghalmi and David DiGiovanni for support and useful
−1 discussions.
0 10
0.6 0.8 1 1.2 0.6 0.8 1 1.2
wavelength
Appendix. Microstructure fibre principles
Figure 13. By increasing the number of cladding rings from three to
five, we obtain low confinement losses for the fundamental mode, Appendix A.1. Confinement mechanisms: TIR and bandgap
suitable for efficient sensing on metre-length scales. All other regions
unwanted modes experience high losses, which can be beneficial in
systems where multi-path interference is a problem. In this section, we review some basic principles of confinement
and guidance in microstructure fibres. Interestingly, the basic
and could allow direct or interferometric detection of light in physical confinement mechanism is not the same for all MOF
these modes. modes. One way to understand the mechanisms is to consider
So far we have looked at three-ring structures for all where a mode falls in the k–β plot, where k = 2π/λ relates
designs. This allows for fast calculation, and puts all designs to the wavelength and β is the axial propagation constant
on an equal footing for ‘fair’ comparisons of confinement loss. defined by equation (4). Such a plot is shown schematically
Once a suitable three-ring design is obtained, one can easily in figure 14. The simplest microstructure fibres are two-
achieve a desirable confinement loss level (with negligible material structures with a high-index nhi and low-index nlo
change in the basic mode structure) by adding more holes material, typically silica glass with vacuum holes. These two
to the cladding. In figure 13, for example, we show the indices divide the plot into three regions, independent of the
loss and overlap of a five-ring design, otherwise identical to geometry of the core or cladding. The properties of waves
that of figure 10. Further loss reduction is easily possible, in these regions are determined by the transverse-k-vector,
down to the limit of material losses: fibres with ten or more 2
k⊥ = k 2 n2 − β 2 , in the two material regions n = nhi and
rings of holes are routinely fabricated, and the required total n = nlo .
cladding diameter is quite reasonable. Absorption in water was
not included in the calculation, but will become significant • For β > nhi k, electromagnetic waves are evanescent
for five or more rings of holes, especially above 1100 nm. in both high- and low-index materials. That is, k⊥ is
For the five-ring structure, the calculated confinement loss in imaginary for both n = nhi and n = nlo , and no guided
the fundamental is below 1 dB m−1 over a wide wavelength modes are possible.
range (750–1150 nm), while the unwanted higher-order modes • For β < nlo k, waves can propagate in both materials (k⊥
(mostly cladding modes, but with some energy in the core) is real everywhere), and so neither material can perfectly
are far more leaky. These results demonstrate a nearly-ideal confine the waves. Index-guiding is therefore impossible
single-mode waveguide for aqueous sensing applications: the and modes must be confined by bandgap effects.
fibre combines almost complete overlap of light with the • For nlo k < β < nhi k, waves propagate in high-index and
sample with acceptable loss over long interaction lengths. are evanescent in low-index materials. Confinement is
The well-shaped mode fields, robust confinement mechanism typically index-guided, but can involve bandgap effects
and relatively large core size present further advantages over as well.
previously proposed waveguides.
Once the specific lattice geometry is known, we can go farther:
Bloch-wave analysis identifies interesting regions where an
5. Conclusions infinite lattice would perfectly exclude light. These regions
are shown as a broad total internal reflection region and narrow
For sensors, as for other applications, microstructure fibres bandgaps in figure 14. The TIR region and bandgaps can be
offer ways around the constraints of traditional waveguides. calculated numerically by several methods (including publicly
Novel strategies for microstructured sensor-fibre design have available software [20]), using approximate formulae [21, 22],
been proposed, with significant advantages over previously or simply the asymptotic long-wavelength limit (for air-fill
proposed evanescent-field and bandgap fibres. Specifically fraction (AFF)):
numerical simulations have demonstrated a single-mode
water-core fibre with <1 dB m−1 loss and near-unity overlap nTIR → (1 − AFF)nglass + AFFnair . (A.1)

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 Microstructure fibres for optical sensing in gases and liquids

nlo obtain a priori estimates of the fundamental and higher-order

k
bandgaps mode lines.
Not all microstructure fibre modes display this strong
total internal confinement. Modes have also been calculated and observed
reflection [25] with power distributed through the cladding. For example,
higher-order modes beyond cutoff were discussed in [15].
nhi
These modes also can be accurately approximated by an
intuitive, quasi-analytical description [16]. In this description,
a mode consists of six Bloch-wave components with Bloch
β vector magnitude kBloch . The approximate modal condition
for a cladding with N rings

Figure 14. The k–β plot shows various confinement mechanisms at 3π(N + 1) 2
kBloch Dclad = nTIR − n2eff = 2π (A.4)
work in a two-material microstructure fibre. First, lines β = nlo k λ
and β = nhi k divide the space into three regions: for β > nhi k no leads to a simple estimate of cladding-mode effective index
modes are possible (hatched region), for β < nlo k only bandgap
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