Atakaramians, S.Afshar Vahid, S.Ebendorff-Heidepriem, H.Nagel, M.Fischer, B.Abbott, D.Monro, T.2009-09-172009-09-172009Optics Express, 2009; 17(16):14053-140621094-40871094-4087http://hdl.handle.net/2440/50920Porous fibers have been identified as a means of achieving low losses, low dispersion and high birefringence among THz polymer fibers. By exploiting optical fiber fabrication techniques, two types of THz polymer porous fibers--spider-web and rectangular porous fibers--with 57% and 65% porosity have been fabricated. The effective refractive index measured by terahertz time domain spectroscopy shows a good agreement between the theoretical and experimental results indicating a lower dispersion for THz porous fiber compared to THz microwires. A birefringence of 0.012 at 0.65 THz is also reported for rectangular porous fiber.en© 2009 Optical Society of AmericaPolymersEquipment Failure AnalysisMaterials TestingOptical FibersPorosityEquipment DesignManufactured MaterialsJournal article002009171010.1364/OE.17.0140530002688437000822-s2.0-6834912720838140Ebendorff-Heidepriem, H. [0000-0002-4877-7770]Abbott, D. [0000-0002-0945-2674]