Coupling to circularly asymmetric modes via long-period gratings made in a standard straight fiber

We demonstrate long-period fiber gratings made in a straight standard optical fiber via a CO, laser side irradiation that couples light between modes of different azimuthal symmetry. We show that such coupling can be even stronger than that to the azimuthally symmetric modes, provided the photoinduced asymmetry in the refractive index change across the fiber cross-section is high enough. This suggests that some previously-observed phenomena with CO2-written LPGs not observed with other types of LPGs may be attributed to LPG resonances that couple light into the cladding modes with higher azimuthal symmetry. We show it on an example of bend-induced LPG resonance position tuning with the resonance depth maintained constant. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.