A graded-index fiber taper design for laser diode to single-mode fiber coupling

A tapered graded-index fiber (GIF) structure is, for the first time, proposed for the efficient fiber-laser coupling. A simple analytical approach based on the ABCD law is utilized to optimally design the parameters of the hemispherically-ended GIF taper. A wide-angle beam propagation method is then employed to compute the fiber mode fields transmitted through the fiber taper in order to evaluate the coupling efficiency. By taking one commercially available GIF as an example, the effectiveness of the new design reported here is verified with a demonstration of high coupling efficiency of nearly 90%.