Photonic crystal waveguides utilizing a modulated lattice structure

We experimentally demonstrate a new class of optical waveguide consisting of a-Si/SiO(2) autocloned photonic crystals with modulated lattice structure. The waveguide utilizes the macroscopic form birefringence of photonic crystals and confines light by the difference in the effective refractive index. A monopole modal field with spot diameters of 6.9 micromx6.5 microm was observed at a wavelength of 1.55 microm. The propagation loss of the waveguide at the wavelength was found to be ~4.2 dB/mm at most.     

Simplified design of low-loss and flat dispersion photonic crystal waveguide on SOI

A low-loss and flat dispersion line-defect photonic crystal waveguide is proposed with a simplified waveguide-design on silicon-on-insulator (SOI) based on hexagonal lattice of 2D photonic crystals. A propagation loss of 3.6 dB/mm and flat dispersion over a large wavelength band is reported with an easy-to-implement design without disturbing the periodicity (keeping lattice constant and hole diameter fixed) in the line-defect photonic crystals. The combined effect of photonic crystals (in-plane periodicity) and the vertical layers on SOI results in efficient waveguiding and dispersion characteristics.     

Loss reduction in silicon nanophotonic waveguide micro-bends through etch profile improvement

Single mode silicon photonic wire waveguides allow low-loss sharp micro-bends, which enables compact photonic devices and circuits. The circuit compactness is achieved at the cost of loss induced by micro-bends, which can seriously affect the device performance. The bend loss strongly depends on the bend radius, polarization, waveguide dimension and profile. In this paper, we present the effect of waveguide profile on the bend loss. We present waveguide profile improvement with optimized etch chemistry and the role of etch chemistry in adapting the etch profile of silicon is investigated. We experimentally demonstrate that by making the waveguide sidewalls vertical, the bend loss can be reduced up to 25% without affecting the propagation loss of the photonic wires. The bend loss of a 2 μm bend has been reduced from 0.039dB/90° bend to 0.028dB/90° bend by changing the sidewall angle from 81° to 90°, respectively. The propagation loss of 2.7 ± 0.1dB/cm and 3 ± 0.09dB/cm was observed for sloped and vertical photonic wires respectively was obtained.     

Design for beam splitting components employing silicon-on-insulator rib waveguide structures

We present a new design for beam splitting components employing a silicon-on-insulator rib waveguide structures. In the new design, a high-index thin-film layer is deposited in the rib section to reduce the wave field dispersive tails in the slab section and accordingly render the mode field a confined spot. This in turn improves the beam splitting performance of some conventional waveguide components such as y branches and multimode interference couplers (MMICs), in terms of the excess loss, fiber coupling loss, and compactness of these components. For a 1 x 2 y-branch beam splitter, the excess loss can be as small as 0.43 dB in the new design, which is much lower than that for a conventional rib waveguide structure (which is 1.28 dB). For a 1 x 2 MMIC in our example, the new rib waveguide structure presents an excess loss of 0.064 dB for the TE mode and 0.046 dB for the TM mode, with negligible nonuniformity in dimensions of 30 microm x 1040 microm, whereas its counterpart (i.e., the one with the same dimensions but without a thin-film layer) presents an excess loss of approximately 0.86 dB for both modes. A conventional MMIC must have dimensions larger than 70 microm x 5650 microm to maintain almost the same low excess loss.     

高透射率慢光速的光子晶体耦合腔波导的研究

将二维三角晶格光子晶体波导和微腔结构结合,优化设计了一种二维三角晶格光子晶体共振耦合腔波导,运用时域有限差分法(FDTD)模拟共振耦合腔波导TE偏振光的透射谱,通过透射谱得到传输光的透射率和群速度。结果表明,合适参数的二维三角晶格共振耦合腔波导在波长1.551μm处的群速度为c/130、透射率为20.1%,在波长1.502μm处的群速度为c/50、透射率为29.2%。运用平面波展开法(PWE)计算的该波导的能带结构对慢光特性进行了分析。这种慢光特性的光子晶体波导将在光存储、光延迟及光子集成等方面有潜在的应用价值。     

Improved design of polarization-maintaining photonic crystal fibers

We propose the realization of single-polarization operation in highly birefringent photonic crystal fibers. The suppression of one of the polarization states is realized by introducing index-matched cladding defect waveguides. The leakage loss of the index-matched polarization state can be enhanced by nearly 4 orders of magnitude. In particular, polarization-dependent loss larger than 2.97 dB/m with transmission loss lower than 0.03 dB/m in a wavelength region ranging from 1.54 to 1.566 microm can be realized in one such fiber.     

Fabrication of ultralow-loss Si/SiO(2) waveguides by roughness reduction

We demonstrate 0.8-dB/cm transmission loss for a single-mode, strip Si/SiO(2) waveguide with submicrometer cross-sectional dimensions. We compare the conventional waveguide-fabrication method with two smoothing technologies that we have developed, oxidation smoothing and anisotropic etching. We observe significant reduction of sidewall roughness with our smoothing technologies, which directly results in reduced scattering losses. The rapid increase in the scattering losses as the waveguide dimension is miniaturized, as seen in conventionally fabricated waveguides, is effectively suppressed in the waveguides made with our smoothing technologies. In the oxidation smoothing case, the loss is reduced from 32 dB/cm for the conventional fabrication method to 0.8 dB/cm for the single-mode waveguide width of 0.5 microm . This is to our knowledge the smallest reported loss for a high-index-difference system such as a Si/SiO(2) strip waveguide.     

基于光子晶体波导定向耦合的光子晶体分/合频器

在完整二维光子晶体中引入线缺陷后,就形成了光子晶体波导。将时域有限差分法(FDTD)和平面波法作为光子晶体理论研究的工具。研究结果表明,光子晶体波导之间的耦合遵循普通介质波导耦合的一般规律,有定向耦合的功能;将两个具有不同耦合长度的光子晶体波导定向耦合器顺序集成在一起,可以组成一个三波长的光子晶体分/合频器。     

新型杂萘联苯型聚芳醚砜硐聚合物光子材料成膜和光学特性

对新型聚合物光子材料杂萘联苯型聚芳醚砜硐(PPESK)波导薄膜的成膜工艺进行了系统的研究。分析了溶剂吸水性对成膜质量的影响,并通过氮气保护的方法获得了具有良好均一性的波导薄膜,其厚度一致性可优于1%,折射率一致性优于0.03%。采用棱镜耦合技术测量分析了PPESK波导薄膜的折射率、双折射、热光系数等光学特性,测量得到该材料在1310 nm波长处的损耗小于0.24 dB/cm,在1550 nm波长处的损耗小于0.52 dB/cm,表明该材料是一类性能良好的聚合物光子材料。     

Numerical simulation of low loss silicon photonic wire waveguide with multiple cladding layers

A different silicon photonic wire waveguide is proposed, which uses multiple thin cladding layers in order to reduce the index contrast between core and cladding interface. The reduced index contrast in the proposed waveguide has led to reduction in the scattering losses by 37% as compared to silicon wire waveguide for 400 nm × 220 nm waveguide dimension. The proposed waveguide has shown significant reduction in bending losses. It offers the bending loss of 0.0118 dB at the radius of 1 μm and 0.0063 dB for a radius of 2 μm at 1.55 μm wavelength as compared to 0.086 and 0.013 dB at the radius of 1 and 2 μm, respectively, offered by silicon photonic wire waveguide at 1.5 μm wavelength. The use of polymer material as top cladding layer resulted in decreasing the sensitivity of effective index against temperature for the designed waveguide by a factor of 2 as compared to silicon wire waveguide.     

Compact and broadband waveguide taper based on partial bandgap photonic crystals

Partial bandgap characteristics of parallelogram lattice photonic crystals are proposed to suppress the radiation modes in a compact dielectric waveguide taper so as to obtain high transmittance in a large wavelength range. Band structure of the photonic crystals shows that there exists a partial bandgap, The photonie crystals with partial bandgap are then used as the cladding of a waveguide taper to reduce the radiation loss efficiently. In comparison with the conventional dielectric taper and the complete bandgap photonic crystal taper, the partial bandgap photonic crystal taper has a high transmittance of above 85% with a wide band of 170 nm.     

Integration of electro-optic polymer modulators with low-loss fluorinated polymer waveguides

We have demonstrated a hybrid Mach-Zehnder optical modulator consisting of a large-core, low-loss fluorinated passive polymer waveguide and an electro-optic (EO) polymer waveguide. The combination exhibits low fiber coupling loss to the passive waveguide and reduced transmission loss because the EO polymer waveguide is used only in the active region. The two waveguides are connected by vertical tapers that permit low-loss adiabatic coupling between the two modes. The half-wave voltage and the insertion loss of the fabricated modulator are 3.6 V and 6 dB, respectively, at a wavelength of 1.55 microm . The estimated coupling loss with the standard single-mode fiber is ~0.5 dB.     

A method of designing photonic crystal grating slow-wave circuit for Ribbon--Beam microwave travelling wave amplifiers

A method of designing a photonic crystal grating slow-wave circuit in which the cylinders of the 2D photonic crystals dot on a cross-sectional plane is established by calculating the band structures of the 2D photonic crystals, and the eigenfrequency of the equivalent waveguide grating. For calculating the band structures, the eigenvalue equations of the photonic crystals in the system of photonic crystal grating slow-wave circuit are derived in a special polarization mode. Two examples are taken to show the method. The design result is validated by the scattering parameters of the same circuit. The result indicates that there exists no photonic band gap if the metal gratings do not extend into the photonic crystals; the design of the circuit without the metal gratings extending into the photonic crystals is less flexible than that with the metal gratings extending into the photonic crystals.     

光子晶体波导定向耦合器

在完整二维光子晶体中引入线缺陷后，就形成了光子晶体波导；将时域有限差分方法(FDTD)用于光子晶体波导耦合研究，计算了不同耦合长度情形下的波导各个出口处的透过率，结果表明：光子晶体波导耦合遵循普通介质波导耦合的一般规律，也有定向耦合的功能。进一步的研究表明：对于不同的频率，光子晶体定向耦合器耦合系数是不同的，并且耦合系数和对应的频率之间近似直线关系。     

Enhanced localization of light in slow wave slot photonic crystal waveguides

A flexible design of slot photonic crystal waveguide with a wide comb is investigated. Introduction of a carefully designed comb within the photonic crystal waveguide allows an accurate dispersion engineering in order to achieve slow light and increase the optical confinement within the comb. The strong light confinement results in an extremely small nonlinear effective area around 0.015 μm². We report experimental realization of a comb photonic crystal waveguide with measured group indices higher than 100 in a Mach-Zehnder interferometer configuration and extract losses limited to 3.7?dB for a 100?μm device at n_g=37.     

Mode-order converter in a multimode waveguide

A novel device that converts the order of modes in an integrated-optic multimode waveguide was proposed and fabricated. The device consists of two mode splitters and tapered waveguides. Its operation at a wavelength of 1.55 microm was confirmed by observation of the output mode profiles. The cross talk measured by an indirect method was >10.2 dB. The excess loss with reference to a straight multimode waveguide was 1.5 dB, compared with the propagation loss of a straight multimode waveguide.     

Study of in-line single-mode optical fiber polarizer

The theoretical calculation method of multilayer metal-clad planar optical waveguide presented by Y. YAMAMOTO is greatly improved and transplant into the optical fiber and a suitable waveguide model of in-line single-mode optical fiber polarizer is set up to study its characteristics, the theorical analyses are in accordance with the experimental re suits. The polarizer whose extinction ratio is more than 30 dB at 0.633μm wavelength with an insertion loss of 0.5 dB is formed by grinding off the cladding on one side of a single-mode fibre and evaporating metal onto the polished durface in our Lab.     

Subwavelength confinement in an integrated metal slot waveguide on silicon

We demonstrate propagation losses of less than 0.8 dB/microm in a metal slot waveguide on silicon with a predicted confinement substantially below the optical wavelength (approximately 1.55 microm). We also show compact and efficient coupling of the high-confinement metal slot waveguide with a standard silicon dielectric waveguide with a coupling efficiency of approximately 2.5 dB per facet.     

Fabrication and performance of a medium-dependent SiO2/Si photonic heterostructure device

An optical device based on a photonic bandgap heterostructure is designed, fabricated, and characterized. The sample contains two sets of Si/SiO2 photonic crystals with different periods. When the device is working in air, it reflects omnidirectionally both TE and TM mode lights at the wavelength near 1.3 microm. The reflectivity measured in the bandgap is higher than 98% in an incident angle range 0 degrees-70 degrees. When the device is surrounded with silica (n > 1.33), it permits the total transmission for the TM mode but prevents the TE mode from propagating, thus behaving as a polarization splitter. The experimental extinction ratio of the reflected TE/TM is approximately 31 dB. The uniformity of the device performance over a large sample area is demonstrated.     

2.5THz环烯烃聚合物中空芯光子晶体光纤设计与实验

采用全矢量有限元法,仿真设计了一种工作在2.5THz频段的中空芯太赫兹光子晶体光纤,用环烯烃聚合物材料(COC)制备了光纤样品,利用CO2激光泵浦气体太赫兹源搭建了测试平台并对光纤的太赫兹波传输性能进行了测试。实测光纤最低损耗0.17dB/cm、平均损耗约0.5dB/cm,在弯曲90°情况下光纤传输损耗波动小于5%,具有良好的可弯曲性;光纤输出端口的模场分布测试结果表明,光纤是以主模进行传输,太赫兹能量很好地被束缚在光纤芯中。