Investigating Transverse Loading Characteristics of Microstructured Fiber Bragg Gratings With an Active Fiber Depolarizer

In this letter, the transverse loading characteristics of Bragg gratings in microstructured optical fibers were investigated by use of an active fiber depolarizer. Increasing transverse load shifts the Bragg wavelength to longer wavelengths; its sensitivity to transverse load decreases with increasing volume of air holes around the fiber core. Such transverse loading characteristics were found to be dependent on the fiber orientations.