Erbium-Doped-Silica Photonic Crystal Fiber Characterization Method: Description and Experimental Check

The present paper reports and discusses a characterization method for erbium-doped-silica photonic crystal fibers based on the measurement of pump power attenuation and gain together with the McCumber theory. The absorption and emission cross sections and the passive losses of the fiber were obtained from a fitting procedure of theoretical to experimental values. The method was checked by means of a home-made photonic crystal fiber to verify its reliability. Finally, it was found that the characteristic parameters obtained by this method can be used to accurately simulate the performance of the fiber and therefore to design devices based on it.