We report the fabrication of silica microstructured optical fibers with the core exposed along the whole length, and characterize the stability of these new fibers when exposed to some typical sensing and storage environments. We show the fiber loss to be the best achieved to date for exposed-core fibers, while the deterioration in the transmission properties is up to ∼2 orders of magnitude better than for the previously reported exposed-core fibers produced in soft glass. This opens up new opportunities for optical fiber sensors requiring long term and/or harsh environmental applications while providing real time analysis anywhere along the fibers length.

© 2012 OSA

1. P. Kasier, E. A. J. Marcatili, and S. E. Miller, “A new optical fiber,” Bell Sys. Tech. J.52, 265–269 (1973).
2. J. C. Knight, T. A. Birks, P. S. J. Russell, and D. M. Atkin, “All-silica single-mode optical fiber with photonic crystal cladding,” Opt. Lett.21, 1547–1549 (1996). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
3. T. M. Monro, W. Belardi, K. Furusawa, J. C. Baggett, N. G. R. Broderick, and D. J. Richardson, “Sensing with microstructured optical fibres,” Meas. Sci. Technol.12, 854–858 (2001). [CrossRef]
4. T. Monro, D. Richardson, and P. Bennett, “Developing holey fibres for evanescent field devices,” Electron. Lett.35, 1188–1189 (1999). [CrossRef]
5. O. S. Wolfbeis, “Fiber-optic chemical sensors and biosensors,” Anal. Chem.80, 4269–4283 (2008). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
6. T. M. Monro and H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, “Progress in microstructured optical fibers,” Annu. Rev. Mater. Res.36, 467–495 (2006). [CrossRef]
7. J. Lægsgaard and A. Bjarklev, “Microstructured optical fibers—fundamentals and applications.” J. Am. Ceram. Soc.89, 2–12 (2006).
8. T. M. Monro, S. Warren-Smith, E. P. Schartner, A. François, S. Heng, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, and S. Afshar V., “Sensing with suspended-core optical fibers,” Opt. Fiber Technol.16, 343–356 (2010). [CrossRef]
9. H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, S. C. Warren-Smith, and T. M. Monro, “Suspended nanowires: fabrication, design and characterization of fibers with nanoscale cores,” Opt. Express17, 2646–2657 (2009). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
10. L. Tong, R. R. Gattass, J. B. Ashcom, S. He, J. Lou, M. Shen, I. Maxwell, and E. Mazur, “Subwavelength-diameter silica wires for low-loss optical wave guiding,” Nature426, 816–819 (2003). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
11. K. Kiang, K. Frampton, T. Monro, R. Moore, J. Tucknott, D. Hewak, D. Richardson, and H. Rutt, “Extruded singlemode non-silica glass holey optical fibres,” Electron. Lett.38, 546–547 (2002). [CrossRef]
12. H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, P. Petropoulos, S. Asimakis, V. Finazzi, R. Moore, K. Frampton, F. Koizumi, D. Richardson, and T. Monro, “Bismuth glass holey fibers with high nonlinearity,” Opt. Express12, 5082–5087 (2004). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
13. J. Leong, P. Petropoulos, J. Price, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, S. Asimakis, R. Moore, K. Frampton, V. Finazzi, X. Feng, T. Monro, and D. Richardson, “High-nonlinearity dispersion-shifted lead-silicate holey fibers for efficient 1-μm pumped supercontinuum generation,” J. Lightwave Technol.24, 183–190 (2006). [CrossRef]
14. J. Jensen, P. Hoiby, G. Emiliyanov, O. Bang, L. Pedersen, and A. Bjarklev, “Selective detection of antibodies in microstructured polymer optical fibers,” Opt. Express13, 5883–5889 (2005). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
15. A. S. Webb, F. Poletti, D. J. Richardson, and J. K. Sahu, “Suspended-core holey fiber for evanescent-field sensing,” Opt. Eng.46, 010503 (2007). [CrossRef]
16. T. G. Euser, J. S. Y. Chen, M. Scharrer, P. S. J. Russell, N. J. Farrer, and P. J. Sadler, “Quantitative broadband chemical sensing in air-suspended solid-core fibers,” J. Appl. Phys.103, 103108 (2008). [CrossRef]
17. A. Mazhorova, A. Markov, A. Ng, R. Chinnappan, O. Skorobogata, M. Zourob, and M. Skorobogatiy, “Label-free bacteria detection using evanescent mode of a suspended core terahertz fiber,” Opt. Express20, 5344–5355 (2012). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
18. S. Afshar V., S. C. Warren-Smith, and T. M. Monro, “Enhancement of fluorescence-based sensing using microstructured optical fibres,” Opt. Express15, 17891–17901 (2007). [CrossRef]
19. E. P. Schartner, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, S. C. Warren-Smith, R. T. White, and T. M. Monro, “Driving down the detection limit in microstructured fiber-based chemical dip sensors,” Sensors11, 2961–2971 (2011). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
20. Y. Ruan, E. P. Schartner, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, P. Hoffmann, and T. M. Monro, “Detection of quantum-dot labelled proteins using soft glass microstructured optical fibers,” Opt. Express15, 17819–17826 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
21. H. Yan, J. Liu, C. Yang, G. Jin, C. Gu, and L. Hou, “Novel index-guided photonic crystal fiber surface-enhanced Raman scattering probe,” Opt. Express16, 8300–8305 (2008). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
22. A. Bjarklev, J. B. Jensen, J. Riishede, J. Broeng, J. Laegsgaard, T. T. Larsen, T. Sorensen, K. Hougaard, and O. Bang, “Photonic crystal structures in sensing technology,” Proc. SPIE5502, 9–16 (2004). [CrossRef]
23. J. E. Debs, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, J. S. Quinton, and T. M. Monro, “A fundamental study into the surface functionalization of soft glass microstructured optical fibers via silane coupling agents,” J. Lightwave Technol.27, 576–582 (2009). [CrossRef]
24. Y. L. Hoo, W. Jin, C. Shi, H. L. Ho, D. N. Wang, and S. C. Ruan, “Design and modeling of a photonic crystal fiber gas sensor,” Appl. Opt.42, 3509–3515 (2003). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
25. C. M. B. Cordeiro, C. J. S. de Matos, E. M. dos Santos, A. Bozolan, J. S. K. Ong, T. Facincani, G. Chesini, A. R. Vaz, and C. H. B. Cruz, “Towards practical liquid and gas sensing with photonic crystal fibres: side access to the fibre microstructure and single-mode liquid-core fibre,” Meas. Sci. Technol.18, 3075–3081 (2007). [CrossRef]
26. C. Martelli, P. Olivero, J. Canning, N. Groothoff, B. Gibson, and S. Huntington, “Micromachining structured optical fibers using focused ion beam milling,” Opt. Lett.32, 1575–1577 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
27. A. van Brakel, C. Grivas, M. N. Petrovich, and D. J. Richardson, “Micro-channels machined in microstructured optical fibers by femtosecond laser,” Opt. Express15, 8731–8736 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
28. J. P. Parry, B. C. Griffiths, N. Gayraud, E. D. McNaghten, A. M. Parkes, W. N. MacPherson, and D. P. Hand, “Towards practical gas sensing with micro-structured fibres,” Meas. Sci. Technol.20, 075301 (2009). [CrossRef]
29. F. M. Cox, R. Lwin, M. C. J. Large, and C. M. B. Cordeiro, “Opening up optical fibres,” Opt. Express15, 11843–11848 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
30. S. C. Warren-Smith, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, T. C. Foo, R. Moore, C. Davis, and T. M. Monro, “Exposed-core microstructured optical fibers for real-time fluorescence sensing,” Opt. Express17, 18533–18542 (2009). [CrossRef]
31. S. Warren-Smith, E. Sinchenko, P. Stoddart, and T. Monro, “Distributed fluorescence sensing using exposed core microstructured optical fiber,” IEEE Photon. Technol. Lett.22, 1385–1387 (2010). [CrossRef]
32. K. Peters, “Polymer optical fiber sensors—a review,” Smart Mater. Struct.20, 013002 (2011). [CrossRef]
33. H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, K. Kuan, M. R. Oermann, K. Knight, and T. M. Monro, “Extruded tellurite glass and fibers with low OH content for mid-infrared applications,” Opt. Mater. Express2, 432–442 (2012). [CrossRef]
34. H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem and T. M. Monro, “Extrusion of complex preforms for microstructured optical fibers,” Opt. Express15, 15086–15092 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
35. S. C. Warren-Smith, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, S. Afshar V., G. McAdam, C. Davis, and T. Monro, “Corrosion sensing of aluminium alloys using exposed-core microstructured optical fibres,” Mater. Forum33, 110–121 (2009).
36. K. Richardson, D. Krol, and K. Hirao, “Glasses for photonic applications,” Int. J. Appl. Glass Sci.1, 74–86 (2010). [CrossRef]
37. M. Li and D. Nolan, “Optical transmission fiber design evolution,” J. Lightwave Technol.26, 1079–1092 (2008). [CrossRef]
38. Heraeus Quarzglas GmbH & Co. KG, Pure Silica Rods for Specialty Fiber Applications, 1st ed. (2012), http://heraeus-quarzglas.com/ .
39. D. Wildeboer, F. Jeganathan, R. G. Price, and R. A. Abuknesha, “Characterization of bacterial proteases with a panel of fluorescent peptide substrates,” Anal. Biochem.384, 321–328 (2009). [CrossRef]
40. M. Y. Sim and S. Gleixner, “Studying the etch rates and selectivity of SiO2 and Al in BHF solutions,” in 2006 16th Biennial University/Government/Industry Microelectronics Symposium (2006), pp. 225–228.
41. C. J. Voyce, A. D. Fitt, and T. M. Monro, “Mathematical modeling as an accurate predictive tool in capillary and microstructured fiber manufacture: the effects of preform rotation,” J. Lightwave Technol.26, 791–798 (2008). [CrossRef]
42. M. Fujiwara, K. Toubaru, and S. Takeuchi, “Optical transmittance degradation in tapered fibers,” Opt. Express19, 8596–8601 (2011). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
43. D. Tallant, T. Michalske, and W. Smith, “The effects of tensile stress on the Raman spectrum of silica glass,” J. Non-Cryst. Solids106, 380–383 (1988). [CrossRef]
44. G. Brambilla, F. Xu, and X. Feng, “Fabrication of optical fibre nanowires and their optical and mechanical characterisation,” Electron. Lett.42, 517–519 (2006). [CrossRef]
45. G. Zhai and L. Tong, “Roughness-induced radiation losses in optical micro or nanofibers,” Opt. Express15, 13805–13816 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
46. R. Brandsch, G. Bar, and M.-H. Whangbo, “On the factors affecting the contrast of height and phase images in tapping mode atomic force microscopy,” Langmuir13, 6349–6353 (1997). [CrossRef]

Anal. Biochem.

• D. Wildeboer, F. Jeganathan, R. G. Price, and R. A. Abuknesha, “Characterization of bacterial proteases with a panel of fluorescent peptide substrates,” Anal. Biochem.384, 321–328 (2009). [CrossRef]

Anal. Chem.

• O. S. Wolfbeis, “Fiber-optic chemical sensors and biosensors,” Anal. Chem.80, 4269–4283 (2008). [CrossRef] [PubMed]

Annu. Rev. Mater. Res.

• T. M. Monro and H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, “Progress in microstructured optical fibers,” Annu. Rev. Mater. Res.36, 467–495 (2006). [CrossRef]

Appl. Opt.

• Y. L. Hoo, W. Jin, C. Shi, H. L. Ho, D. N. Wang, and S. C. Ruan, “Design and modeling of a photonic crystal fiber gas sensor,” Appl. Opt.42, 3509–3515 (2003). [CrossRef] [PubMed]

Bell Sys. Tech. J.

• P. Kasier, E. A. J. Marcatili, and S. E. Miller, “A new optical fiber,” Bell Sys. Tech. J.52, 265–269 (1973).

Electron. Lett.

• T. Monro, D. Richardson, and P. Bennett, “Developing holey fibres for evanescent field devices,” Electron. Lett.35, 1188–1189 (1999). [CrossRef]
• K. Kiang, K. Frampton, T. Monro, R. Moore, J. Tucknott, D. Hewak, D. Richardson, and H. Rutt, “Extruded singlemode non-silica glass holey optical fibres,” Electron. Lett.38, 546–547 (2002). [CrossRef]
• G. Brambilla, F. Xu, and X. Feng, “Fabrication of optical fibre nanowires and their optical and mechanical characterisation,” Electron. Lett.42, 517–519 (2006). [CrossRef]

IEEE Photon. Technol. Lett.

• S. Warren-Smith, E. Sinchenko, P. Stoddart, and T. Monro, “Distributed fluorescence sensing using exposed core microstructured optical fiber,” IEEE Photon. Technol. Lett.22, 1385–1387 (2010). [CrossRef]

Int. J. Appl. Glass Sci.

• K. Richardson, D. Krol, and K. Hirao, “Glasses for photonic applications,” Int. J. Appl. Glass Sci.1, 74–86 (2010). [CrossRef]

J. Am. Ceram. Soc.

• J. Lægsgaard and A. Bjarklev, “Microstructured optical fibers—fundamentals and applications.” J. Am. Ceram. Soc.89, 2–12 (2006).

J. Appl. Phys.

• T. G. Euser, J. S. Y. Chen, M. Scharrer, P. S. J. Russell, N. J. Farrer, and P. J. Sadler, “Quantitative broadband chemical sensing in air-suspended solid-core fibers,” J. Appl. Phys.103, 103108 (2008). [CrossRef]

J. Lightwave Technol.

• J. E. Debs, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, J. S. Quinton, and T. M. Monro, “A fundamental study into the surface functionalization of soft glass microstructured optical fibers via silane coupling agents,” J. Lightwave Technol.27, 576–582 (2009). [CrossRef]
• J. Leong, P. Petropoulos, J. Price, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, S. Asimakis, R. Moore, K. Frampton, V. Finazzi, X. Feng, T. Monro, and D. Richardson, “High-nonlinearity dispersion-shifted lead-silicate holey fibers for efficient 1-μm pumped supercontinuum generation,” J. Lightwave Technol.24, 183–190 (2006). [CrossRef]
• M. Li and D. Nolan, “Optical transmission fiber design evolution,” J. Lightwave Technol.26, 1079–1092 (2008). [CrossRef]
• C. J. Voyce, A. D. Fitt, and T. M. Monro, “Mathematical modeling as an accurate predictive tool in capillary and microstructured fiber manufacture: the effects of preform rotation,” J. Lightwave Technol.26, 791–798 (2008). [CrossRef]

J. Non-Cryst. Solids

• D. Tallant, T. Michalske, and W. Smith, “The effects of tensile stress on the Raman spectrum of silica glass,” J. Non-Cryst. Solids106, 380–383 (1988). [CrossRef]

Langmuir

• R. Brandsch, G. Bar, and M.-H. Whangbo, “On the factors affecting the contrast of height and phase images in tapping mode atomic force microscopy,” Langmuir13, 6349–6353 (1997). [CrossRef]

Mater. Forum

• S. C. Warren-Smith, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, S. Afshar V., G. McAdam, C. Davis, and T. Monro, “Corrosion sensing of aluminium alloys using exposed-core microstructured optical fibres,” Mater. Forum33, 110–121 (2009).

Meas. Sci. Technol.

• J. P. Parry, B. C. Griffiths, N. Gayraud, E. D. McNaghten, A. M. Parkes, W. N. MacPherson, and D. P. Hand, “Towards practical gas sensing with micro-structured fibres,” Meas. Sci. Technol.20, 075301 (2009). [CrossRef]
• C. M. B. Cordeiro, C. J. S. de Matos, E. M. dos Santos, A. Bozolan, J. S. K. Ong, T. Facincani, G. Chesini, A. R. Vaz, and C. H. B. Cruz, “Towards practical liquid and gas sensing with photonic crystal fibres: side access to the fibre microstructure and single-mode liquid-core fibre,” Meas. Sci. Technol.18, 3075–3081 (2007). [CrossRef]
• T. M. Monro, W. Belardi, K. Furusawa, J. C. Baggett, N. G. R. Broderick, and D. J. Richardson, “Sensing with microstructured optical fibres,” Meas. Sci. Technol.12, 854–858 (2001). [CrossRef]

Nature

• L. Tong, R. R. Gattass, J. B. Ashcom, S. He, J. Lou, M. Shen, I. Maxwell, and E. Mazur, “Subwavelength-diameter silica wires for low-loss optical wave guiding,” Nature426, 816–819 (2003). [CrossRef] [PubMed]

Opt. Eng.

• A. S. Webb, F. Poletti, D. J. Richardson, and J. K. Sahu, “Suspended-core holey fiber for evanescent-field sensing,” Opt. Eng.46, 010503 (2007). [CrossRef]

Opt. Express

• J. Jensen, P. Hoiby, G. Emiliyanov, O. Bang, L. Pedersen, and A. Bjarklev, “Selective detection of antibodies in microstructured polymer optical fibers,” Opt. Express13, 5883–5889 (2005). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• Y. Ruan, E. P. Schartner, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, P. Hoffmann, and T. M. Monro, “Detection of quantum-dot labelled proteins using soft glass microstructured optical fibers,” Opt. Express15, 17819–17826 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• H. Yan, J. Liu, C. Yang, G. Jin, C. Gu, and L. Hou, “Novel index-guided photonic crystal fiber surface-enhanced Raman scattering probe,” Opt. Express16, 8300–8305 (2008). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• F. M. Cox, R. Lwin, M. C. J. Large, and C. M. B. Cordeiro, “Opening up optical fibres,” Opt. Express15, 11843–11848 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• S. C. Warren-Smith, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, T. C. Foo, R. Moore, C. Davis, and T. M. Monro, “Exposed-core microstructured optical fibers for real-time fluorescence sensing,” Opt. Express17, 18533–18542 (2009). [CrossRef]
• H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem and T. M. Monro, “Extrusion of complex preforms for microstructured optical fibers,” Opt. Express15, 15086–15092 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• A. van Brakel, C. Grivas, M. N. Petrovich, and D. J. Richardson, “Micro-channels machined in microstructured optical fibers by femtosecond laser,” Opt. Express15, 8731–8736 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, S. C. Warren-Smith, and T. M. Monro, “Suspended nanowires: fabrication, design and characterization of fibers with nanoscale cores,” Opt. Express17, 2646–2657 (2009). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, P. Petropoulos, S. Asimakis, V. Finazzi, R. Moore, K. Frampton, F. Koizumi, D. Richardson, and T. Monro, “Bismuth glass holey fibers with high nonlinearity,” Opt. Express12, 5082–5087 (2004). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• A. Mazhorova, A. Markov, A. Ng, R. Chinnappan, O. Skorobogata, M. Zourob, and M. Skorobogatiy, “Label-free bacteria detection using evanescent mode of a suspended core terahertz fiber,” Opt. Express20, 5344–5355 (2012). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• S. Afshar V., S. C. Warren-Smith, and T. M. Monro, “Enhancement of fluorescence-based sensing using microstructured optical fibres,” Opt. Express15, 17891–17901 (2007). [CrossRef]
• M. Fujiwara, K. Toubaru, and S. Takeuchi, “Optical transmittance degradation in tapered fibers,” Opt. Express19, 8596–8601 (2011). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• G. Zhai and L. Tong, “Roughness-induced radiation losses in optical micro or nanofibers,” Opt. Express15, 13805–13816 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]

Opt. Fiber Technol.

• T. M. Monro, S. Warren-Smith, E. P. Schartner, A. François, S. Heng, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, and S. Afshar V., “Sensing with suspended-core optical fibers,” Opt. Fiber Technol.16, 343–356 (2010). [CrossRef]

Opt. Lett.

• J. C. Knight, T. A. Birks, P. S. J. Russell, and D. M. Atkin, “All-silica single-mode optical fiber with photonic crystal cladding,” Opt. Lett.21, 1547–1549 (1996). [CrossRef] [PubMed]
• C. Martelli, P. Olivero, J. Canning, N. Groothoff, B. Gibson, and S. Huntington, “Micromachining structured optical fibers using focused ion beam milling,” Opt. Lett.32, 1575–1577 (2007). [CrossRef] [PubMed]

Opt. Mater. Express

• H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, K. Kuan, M. R. Oermann, K. Knight, and T. M. Monro, “Extruded tellurite glass and fibers with low OH content for mid-infrared applications,” Opt. Mater. Express2, 432–442 (2012). [CrossRef]

Proc. SPIE

• A. Bjarklev, J. B. Jensen, J. Riishede, J. Broeng, J. Laegsgaard, T. T. Larsen, T. Sorensen, K. Hougaard, and O. Bang, “Photonic crystal structures in sensing technology,” Proc. SPIE5502, 9–16 (2004). [CrossRef]

Sensors

• E. P. Schartner, H. Ebendorff-Heidepriem, S. C. Warren-Smith, R. T. White, and T. M. Monro, “Driving down the detection limit in microstructured fiber-based chemical dip sensors,” Sensors11, 2961–2971 (2011). [CrossRef] [PubMed]

Smart Mater. Struct.

• K. Peters, “Polymer optical fiber sensors—a review,” Smart Mater. Struct.20, 013002 (2011). [CrossRef]

Other

• Heraeus Quarzglas GmbH & Co. KG, Pure Silica Rods for Specialty Fiber Applications, 1st ed. (2012), http://heraeus-quarzglas.com/ .
• M. Y. Sim and S. Gleixner, “Studying the etch rates and selectivity of SiO2 and Al in BHF solutions,” in 2006 16th Biennial University/Government/Industry Microelectronics Symposium (2006), pp. 225–228.

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