Two-wire Terahertz Fibers with Porous Dielectric Support

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel two-wire terahertz fiber with porous dielectric support, offering practical advantages and improved optical properties over traditional designs, with tunable performance through cladding porosity.

Contribution

The paper presents a new plasmonic THz fiber design that simplifies handling and enhances optical performance by adjusting cladding porosity.

Findings

Composite fibers have wider bandwidths and lower dispersion than porous fibers.

Increasing cladding porosity improves optical properties.

Porous dielectric support facilitates practical manipulation of the fiber.

Abstract

A novel plasmonic THz fiber is described that features two metallic wires that are held in place by the porous dielectric cladding functioning as a mechanical support. This design is more convenient for practical applications than a classic two metal wire THz waveguide as it allows direct manipulations of the fiber without the risk of perturbing its core-guided mode. Not surprisingly, optical properties of such fibers are inferior to those of a classic two-wire waveguide due to the presence of lossy dielectric near an inter-wire gap. At the same time, composite fibers outperform porous fibers of the same geometry both in bandwidth of operation and in lower dispersion. Finally, by increasing cladding porosity one can consistently improve optical properties of the composite fibers.