Hollow-core infrared fiber incorporating metal-wire metamaterial

Infrared (IR) light is considered important for short-range wireless communication, thermal sensing, spectroscopy, material processing, medical surgery, astronomy etc. However, IR light is in general much harder to transport than optical light or microwave radiation. Existing hollow-core IR waveguides usually use a layer of metallic coating on the inner wall of the waveguide. Such a metallic layer, though reflective, still absorbs guided light significantly due to its finite Ohmic loss, especially for transverse-magnetic (TM) light. In this paper, we show that metal-wire based metamaterials may serve as an efficient TM reflector, reducing propagation loss of the TM mode by two orders of magnitude. By further imposing a conventional metal cladding layer, which reflects specifically transverse-electric (TE) light, we can potentially obtain a low-loss hollow-core fiber. Simulations confirm that loss values for several low-order modes are comparable to the best results reported so far. (C) 2009 Optical Society of America