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Fiber optical temperature and strain sensors have been extensively investigated for applications in the civil structures to ensure safety and prevent disasters in advance. Most of the demonstrated fiber sensors are based on the silica fibers to form an interferometer by measuring the spectrum wavelength shift caused by the change of the refractive index and fiber length, and the sensitivities, defined as the rate of wavelength shift with respect to temperature or strain, are limited by the small values of thermal-expansion coefficient and thermo-optic effect of the silica materials. To improve the sensitivity, we designed the dual-core As2Se3-PMMA fiber with the PMMA cladding diameter 56.5 times larger than that of the As2Se3 cores, which brings out many interesting sensing applications. Nonlinear devices have a variety of practical applications including parametric amplification, all-optical switching, super-continuum generation, and sensing applications. Tapered chalcogenide-polymer fiber structures composed of an As2Se3 core and a polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) cladding are a promising platform for nonlinear applications because the As2Se3 core provides high nonlinearity over the near- and mid-infrared spectral ranges for compact nonlinear devices with low power consumption and the PMMA cladding provides high mechanical strength for easy handling. Advanced As2Se3-PMMA fiber structures such as dual-core fibers that support guided propagation of an even mode and an odd mode will open the way for a variety of novel devices in the near- and mid-IR wavelength range. In my work I utilized two As2Se3 fibers and a polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) tube for the fabrication of dual-core As2Se3-PMMA tapers and demonstration of the sensing applications and nonlinear optical effects. The thesis mainly consists of three parts: the fabrication process, the sensing applications, and the nonlinear applications in the tapered dual-core As2Se3-PMMA fiber. In the first part, the fabrication process of the tapered dual-core As2Se3-PMMA fiber is introduced. The dual-core As2Se3-PMMA fibers are fabricated using a rod-in-tube method. The images of the setups and fibers in process are listed. In the second part, a theoretical model for temperature and strain measurement and four sensing applications are introduced. Firstly, we demonstrate an approach for high-sensitivity simultaneous temperature and strain measurement in a dual-core As2Se3-PMMA taper with As2Se3 core diameter of 0.55 μm. High measurement sensitivities are observed for both principal polarization axes of the tapered dual-core As2Se3-PMMA fiber with temperature sensitivities of -115 pm/ºC for axis-1, -35.5 pm/ºC for axis-2, and strain sensitivities of -4.21 pm/με for axis-1 and -3.16 pm/με for axis-2. Secondly, the thermal forces in a dual-core As2Se3-PMMA taper are investigated. A temperature-insensitive strain sensor is proposed and demonstrated based on the thermal forces. Finally, two approaches for temperature and strain sensitivity enhancement are investigated. The first approach is by reducing the value of the variation of the difference between phases of the even and odd modes with respect to wavelength (∂ϕd(λ)/∂λ) and increasing thermal-forces in a dual-core As2Se3-PMMA taper with As2Se3 core diameter of 2.5 μm. The value of ∂ϕd(λ)/∂λ decreases with the As2Se3 core diameter and thermal-forces on the As2Se3 cores are enhanced in the fibers with large PMMA cladding, which work together to enhance the measurement sensitivity. The second approach is based on effective group-velocity matching between the even and odd modes of a dual-core As2Se3-PMMA taper on which an antisymmetric long-period grating is inscribed. The variation of the difference between phases of the even and odd modes with respect to wavelength tends to 0 (∂ϕd(λ)/∂λ→0) near the resonance wavelength of the grating due to the effective group-velocity matching between the two modes, and consequently, thermally-induced change of the difference between phases of the two modes ϕd (λ) leads to a large wavelength shift indicating enhancement of the temperature measurement sensitivity. In the third part, I study the nonlinear optical effects in the hybrid fibers. Firstly, I demonstrate modulation instability within the normal-dispersion regime in a dual-core As2Se3-PMMA fiber. Then I review the work about the forward stimulated Brillouin scattering and its sensing applications. The radial and torsional-radial guided acoustic modes of silica fibers and tapered dual-core As2Se3-PMMA fibers are investigated experimentally and the preliminary results are presented.

La thèse porte sur la modélisation électromagnétique et la simulation de composites stratifiés plans (laminés), renforcés par des fibres organisées périodiquement. L'objectif est d'acquérir une bonne compréhension du comportement électromagnétique de telles structures, en première et étape de ce que pourrait ultérieurement être la production d’images mettant en évidence la localisation de zones éventuellement endommagées, et fournissant une certaine quantification de celles-ci. La thèse proprement dite se concentre donc sur la construction et l’évaluation de modèles de la diffraction électromagnétique par des composites multicouches tels que chaque couche est renforcée par des fibres disposées périodiquement.Est d’abord investiguée la diffraction par une plaque diélectrique (mono-couche) au sein de laquelle des fibres cylindriques de section circulaire de même rayon sont incorporées périodiquement, ces fibres ayant la même orientation de leurs axes et la même distance de centre à centre. Un cas bidimensionnel impliquant des ondes planes E ou H-polarisées, ainsi que des faisceaux gaussiens, normalement ou obliquement incidents, est d'abord pris en considération afin de mieux comprendre principes et philosophies des méthodes de choix, le couplage de mode et l'expansion multipolaire. Puis le travail est étendu, la diffraction de la plaque sous un éclairement tridimensionnel (conique) étant alors traitée en détail, ce qui montre aussi le potentiel de la méthodologie mise en œuvre si l’on souhaite obtenir la réponse électromagnétique de la structure à une source ponctuelle.Un composite multicouche, plus courant, mais plus complexe, qui est fait d’un empilement de plaques l'une sur l'autre, est alors étudié. Deux différentes espèces de composites sont ici prises en compte. Pour étudier la première, dont les fibres dans les différentes couches possèdent les mêmes orientations, des méthodes à base de matrices dites S ou dites T sont introduites, impliquant entre autre de s’intéresser à une résolution convenable du système linéaire produit selon le couplage de mode à la transition entre deux couches adjacentes. Une investigation de la deuxième espèce de composites suit alors, pour lequel les fibres au sein des différentes couches sont orientées dans des directions différentes quelconques, ce que permet une extension précautionneuse des approches précédentes. Une certaine attention est également portée au problème de l'homogénéisation des composites, de manière à lier les démarches à petite échelle telles que développées dans la thèse à celles à grande échelle souvent les seules prises en compte dans le contrôle non destructif et l’imagerie des composites stratifiés.De nombreux résultats de simulations numériques sont proposés et validés autant que possible par des résultats de référence de la littérature (notamment dans le cas de cristaux photoniques) et l'utilisation de solveurs « brute-force ». L'accent est aussi mis sur des cas particuliers de matériaux composites (ceux à base de fibres de verre et ceux à base de fibres de carbone) qui sont le plus souvent rencontrés dans les applications pratiques, avec des bandes de fréquences appropriées choisies en accord avec le comportement des fibres, principalement diélectrique ou principalement conducteur. / The contribution is about the electromagnetic modeling of fiber-reinforced periodically organized composite laminates. The final goal is to gain a good understanding of their electromagnetic behavior as well as to acquire images that should exhibit the location of possibly damaged zones, and provide some quantification of these zones. The thesis focuses on the scattering of well-organized periodic structures and building up an efficient full-wave computational model for multilayered composites, wherein each layer is reinforced by periodically arranged fibers, which is the first step for further investigation of the disorganized one.The work firstly considered the scattering problem of a slab in which infinite circular fibers, with the same radius, are periodically embedded with the same orientation of their axes and the same center-to-center distance. A 2-dimensional problem with normally and obliquely incident E- and H-polarized plane waves as well as Gaussian beams is firstly considered for understanding the principles and philosophies of the used mode-matching method and multipole expansion. Then the work is extended to the investigation if the scattering of the slab under illumination of a conically incident 3-dimensional electromagnetic wave, which shows the potential of the work for obtaining the response of the structure to a point source.A more practical but complicated multilayered composite, constructed by stacking up the slabs one over the other, is further investigated. Two different composites are taken into account. To study the first composite, with fibers in different layers having the same orientations, T-matrix- and S-matrix-based methods are introduced into the work for solving the linear system produced by mode-matching at the boundaries between two adjacent layers. Then, further investigation of the second kind of composite, wherein the fibers within different layers are orientated into different directions, is carried out by extending the approach properly.Some attention is also given to homogenization issues, so as to link small-scale approaches as developed in the thesis with large-scale ones as often considered in non-destructive testing of composite laminates.Extensive numerical simulations are proposed, validated whenever possible by reference results taken from the literature (notably in the case of photonic crystals) and the use of brute-force solvers. Emphasis is also on special cases of composites (glass-fiber- and graphite-fiber-based ones) as most often faced in practical applications, with appropriate frequency bands in harmony with the dielectric or conductive aspect of the fibers.