Arbitrarily shaped inhomogeneous optical fiber or integrated optical waveguides

Using the finite element technique, a numerical method is devloped so that one may obtain the propagation characteristics of optical waves along guiding structures whose cores may be of arbitrary cross-sectional shape and whose material media may be inhomogeneous in more than one transverse direction. Several specific examples are given and the results are compared with those obtained by other exact or approximate methods. Very close agreement was found. The method developed here can easily be applied to many important problems dealing with practical optical fiber or integrated optical waveguides whose cross-sectional index of refraction distribution may be quite arbitrary.