A Low-Profile 3D-Printed Hollow-Core Fiber with Hybrid Cladding for D-Band
Authors:
Shehab Khan Noor, Mengqin Gu, Sining An, Heike Ebendorff-Heidepriem, Deepak Mishra, Shaghik Atakaramians
Abstract:
This paper presents the design, fabrication, and experimental validation of a compact 3D-printed hollow-core antiresonant fiber with hybrid dielectric–metal cladding for D-band (0.13–0.17 THz) applications. The metallic outer coating enhances confinement by reflecting leaking fields back into the core, thereby reducing propagation loss. The proposed fiber, fabricated using Topas and wrapped with an aluminium layer, exhibits five antiresonant transmission bands across 0.1–1 THz. With an outer diameter of 4.88 mm, the fiber achieves simulated and measured losses of 5.6 dB/m and 11.9 dB/m at 0.158 THz, respectively. Numerical analysis shows a group delay of 4.16 ± 0.81 ns and an air-core power fraction exceeding 88%. The proposed design demonstrates the smallest reported normalized core size (Dcore/λ = 1.89 at 0.158 THz) among 3D-printed THz fibers, offering a promising solution for compact terahertz interconnects.
