Multi-mode to single-mode conversion in a 61 port Photonic Lantern

Efficient multi-mode (MM) to single-mode (SM) conversion in a 61 port splitter or Photonic Lantern is demonstrated. The coupling loss from a 100 mu m core diameter MM section to an ensemble of 61 SM fibers and back to another 100 mu m core MM section is measured to be as low as 0.76 dB. This demonstration shows the feasibility of using the Photonic Lanterns within the field of astrophotonics for coupling MM star-light to an ensemble of SM fibers in order to perform fiber Bragg grating based spectral filtering. (C) 2010 Optical Society of America