Design of double cladding dispersion flattened photonic crystal fiber with deformation insensitive outer cladding air-holes

A design of double cladding dispersion flattened photonic crystal fiber (DF-PCF) is proposed. To employ traditional stack and draw technology, the cladding of the DF-PCF is consisted of triangular periodic air-holes with the same hole to hole pitch. Simulation results show that the small air-holes in the inner cladding are mainly for dispersion management. The large air-holes in the outer cladding are mainly used for light confinement and have little impact on the dispersion tailoring. Thus, the dispersion profile of the double cladding DF-PCFs is insensitive to the deformation of air-holes in the outer cladding. Considering that the larger air-holes are apt to deform in the drawing procedure, the characteristics mentioned above make the realization of DF-PCFs relative easy by employing conventional stack and draw technology and modest air-hole rings (less than 10 rings) in the cladding.