Genetic algorithms in design and characterization of rare earth doped fiber amplifiers

Genetic algorithms (GAs) have been successfully employed in a number of applied electromagnetism problems. They constitute attractive and intriguing optimization tools because of their efficiency, versatility and strength. In particular, their operation strategy is noticeably for its capability to identify solutions in complex multi-dimension spaces. This paper, at first, gives an admittedly incomplete review of GA applications taken by literature. Moreover, a home made genetic algorithm, optimized with reference to suitable selection, cross-over, mutation and elitism routines for modelling photonic crystal fiber erbium-doped amplifiers is described in detail. This procedure constitutes an actual example highlighting the GA steps to be followed for designing and characterizing optical active waveguides