Wide-band dispersion compensating optical fiber

A novel technique for wide-band dispersion compensation using multiply cladded fiber is presented here. The compensating fiber is designed to operate in LP/sub 11/ mode near its cutoff. The dispersion calculations are carried out by solving the wave equation with the help of quadratic FEM. It is shown that when an optimally designed dispersion compensating fiber is added with a step index, single mode fiber in proportion of 1:22.24, the average compensated dispersion reduces below 0.47 ps/km-nm over a wavelength range of 1480 to 1580 nm. The technique suggests a cost effective solution for upgrading the existing fiber-optic networks to future WDM systems.