WEAKLY GUIDING ANALYSIS OF ELLIPTIC-CORE STEP-INDEX WAVE-GUIDES BASEDON THE CHARACTERISTIC-NUMBERS OF MATHIEUS EQUATION

A new weak guidance analysis for step index elliptical core optical fi bers is developed, The method shows that weakly guiding, or linearly p olarized (LP), modes are determined by and correspond uniquely to the characteristic numbers of Mathieu's equation, This is the first analys is of elliptical core weakly guiding modes which determines propagatio n constants and indexes modes by directly solving the underlying Mathi eu's equation through the sole use of characteristic numbers, The resu lting new analysis resolves an ambiguity in the standard literature co ncerning the classification of weakly guiding modes.