Investigation of Intermodal Four-Wave Mixing for Nonlinear Signal Processing in Few-Mode Fibers

We present a theoretical and experimental investigation of inter-modal four-wave mixing (FWM). After analyzing the phase-matching condition as the fundamental condition for efficient FWM, we show the impact of the individual mode's propagation characteristics, such as differential mode delay and chromatic dispersion on the power of the generated idler. We verify the theoretical analysis with experimental measurements of intermodal FWM. We conclude that efficient broadband intermodal FWM can only be achieved for one specific FWM process and requires very close values of chromatic dispersion in all interacting fiber modes.