Ultrashort-pulse investigation of the propagation properties of the LP(11) mode in 1.55-mum communication fibers.

The coupling of an ultrashort laser pulse into a single-mode optical communication fiber gives rise to two propagating pulses as a result of the excitation of two guided modes, the fundamental, LP(01) , and the leaky, LP(11) . Such a phenomenon provides a new approach to the study of the propagation properties of the LP(11) mode. An experiment with tunable 110-fs pulses at a wavelength near 1550 nm is described. Information about the group velocity, the polarization-rotation length, the attenuation coefficient, and the cutoff wavelength of the LP(11) mode is obtained in a simple and direct way for various fibers.