硅基光波导开关技术综述

硅基光波导开关技术是公认的低成本光交换技术,在电信网络、数据中心和高性能计算领域中都具有非常广泛的应用前景.本文系统综述了近年来硅基光波导开关技术研究取得的主要进展,首先对马赫-曾德尔干涉仪型、微环谐振型和微电子机械系统驱动波导型三种硅基光波导开关技术进行了介绍,并对不同原理的光开关技术的应用场景进行了总结;然后讨论了影响大端口光开关性能的关键技术,特别着重于拓扑架构、无源器件和光电封装等方面;最后对硅基光波导开关技术的技术挑战和研究方向进行了展望,其对未来硅基全光交换技术的实用化具有指导性意义.

Reivew of silicon photonic switches

Silicon photonic switch is recognized as a cost-effective optical switching technology because it has many applications in long-haul telecommunication networks, short-reach data center and high-performance computing. In this paper, the research progress of various silicon photonic switch technologies is reviewed systematically. Firstly, the principles of three kinds of switch technologies including Mach-Zehnder interferometer (thermo-optic and carrier-injection types), micro-ring resonator (thermo-optic and carrier-injection types) and micro-electro-mechanical-system actuated waveguide coupler (electrostatic actuated type) are introduced. The switch technologies with the state-of-the-art insertion loss, crosstalk, switch time, footprint and power consumption are summarized and compared. Then the recent demonstrations of large-port silicon photonic matrix based on the above switch technologies are discussed. In this paper, we also investigate the key technologies such as topological architecture, passive components and optoelectronic packaging, which affect the performance of large-port optical switch matrix. Specifically, we study the scalability of various topologies, low-loss/broadband waveguide components, high-density optical/electrical packaging and control interface to improve the overall performance of the silicon photonic switch matrix. Finally, we discuss the critical technical challenges that might hamper the commercialization of silicon photonic switches and envision their future.