Quasi-Rayleigh light scattering by internal elements of a metamaterial in a light-carrying core of a single-mode optical fiber based on the Veselago effect

Abstract

At present, single-mode optical fibers composed of metamaterials—so-called “left-handed” optical media—for the far- and mid-IR ranges have already been created. In the near future, left-handed singlemode optical fibers for the visible and near-IR ranges will be created, light-carrying cores of which will be composed by an ordered structure of dielectric elements, the dimensions of which will be much smaller than the light wavelength, while the effective refractive index of the structure will be negative; i.e., the structure will possess the so-called “Veselago effect.” We show that, because the dimensions of these dielectric elements many times exceed the dimensions of molecules of optical media, the elements should strongly scatter light, with this scattering considerably exceeding the Rayleigh (molecular) light scattering that occurs in conventional quartz single-mode optical fibers. We propose to term this phenomenon the quasi-Rayleigh light scattering. Numerical estimates of the quasi-Rayleigh light scattering for left-handed single-mode optical fibers at a light wavelength of λ = 1.55 μm have been made.