Detailed study of bending effects in large mode area segmented cladding fibers

This paper studies the bending effects on segmented cladding fibers (SCFs) in detail. Rod-type SCFs have offered large effective mode areas (EMAs) very successfully. The low-index segments in the design also enable the optical fibers to be bend-resistant. In this paper, the bending performance of the SCFs has been investigated by using the finite element method. The results indicate that SCFs can provide low-loss effective single-mode operation in a wide bandwidth under a bent configuration, due to the leakage losses of the higher-order modes (HOMs). A large ratio between the HOMs and the fundamental mode losses can be ensured, over a wide range of duty cycle, refractive index difference, and bending radius. Therefore, the required fabrication accuracy decreases. The mode loss ratio and EMA are independent of the bending orientation. Operating at 1550 nm and 10 cm bend radius, large EMA (754  μm²) is achievable with a large loss ratio (>30). The trade-offs between loss, EMA, and bending are studied. The structure has potential for compact high power fiber lasers, amplifiers, and beam delivery applications.