Si3N4 photonic integration platform at 1 \ub5m for optical interconnects

Vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) are the predominant technology for high-speed short-range interconnects in data centers. Most short-range interconnects rely on GaAs-based multi-mode VCSELs and multi-mode fiber links operating at 850 nm. Recently, GaAs-based high-speed single-mode VCSELs at wavelengths > 1 \ub5m have been demonstrated, which increases the interconnect reach using a single-mode fiber while maintaining low energy dissipation. If a suitable platform for passive wavelength- and space-multiplexing were developed in this wavelength range, this single-mode technology could deliver the multi-Tb/s interconnect capacity that will be required in future data centers. In this work, we show the first passive Si3N4 platform in the 1-\ub5m band (1030-1075 nm) with an equivalent loss < 0.3 dB/cm, which is compatible with the system requirements of high-capacity interconnects. The waveguide structure is optimized to achieve simultaneously single-mode operation and low bending radius, and we demonstrate a wide range of high-performance building blocks, including arrayed waveguide gratings, Mach-Zehnder interferometers, splitters and low-loss fiber interfaces. This technology could be instrumental in scaling up the capacity and reducing the footprint of VCSEL-based optical interconnects and, thanks to the broad transparency in the near-infrared and compatibility with the Yb fiber amplifier window, enabling new applications in other domains as optical microscopy and nonlinear optics

Automatic Tuning of Silicon Photonics Millimeter-Wave Transceivers Building Blocks

Today, continuously growing wireless traffic have guided the progress in the wireless communication systems. Now, evolution towards next generation (5G) wireless communication systems are actively researched to accommodate expanding future data traffic. As one of the most promising candidates, integrating photonic devices in to the existing wireless system is considered to improve the performance of the systems. Emerging silicon photonic integrated circuits lead this integration more practically, and open new possibilities to the future communication systems. In this dissertation, the development of the electrical wireless communication systems are briefly explained. Also, development of the microwave photonics and silicon photonics are described to understand the possibility of the hybrid SiP integrated wireless communication systems. A limitation of the current electrical wireless systems are addressed, and hybrid integrated mm-wave silicon photonic receiver, and silicon photonic beamforming transmitter are proposed and analyzed in system level. In the proposed mm-wave silicon photonic receiver has 4th order pole-zero silicon photonic filter in the system. Photonic devices are vulnerable to the process and temperature variations. It requires manual calibration, which is expensive, time consuming, and prone to human errors. Therefore, precise automatic calibration solution with modified silicon photonic filter structure is proposed and demonstrated. This dissertation demonstrates fully automatic tuning of silicon photonic all-pass filter (APF)-based pole/zero filters using a monitor-based tuning method that calibrates the initial response by controlling each pole and zero individually via micro-heaters. The proposed tuning approach calibrates severely degraded initial responses to the designed elliptic filter shapes and allows for automatic bandwidth and center frequency reconfiguration of these filters. This algorithm is demonstrated on 2nd- and 4th-order filters fabricated in a standard silicon photonics foundry process. After the initial calibration, only 300ms is required to reconfigure a filter to a different center frequency. Thermal crosstalk between the micro-heaters is investigated, with substrate thinning demonstrated to suppress this effect and reduce filter calibration to less than half of the original thick substrate times. This fully automatic tuning approach opens the possibility of employing silicon photonic filters in real communication systems. Also, in the proposed beamforming transmitter, true-time delay ring resonator based 1x4 beamforming network is imbedded. A proposed monitor-based tuning method compensates fabrication variations and thermal crosstalk by controlling micro-heaters individually using electrical monitors. The proposed tuning approach successfully demonstrated calibration of OBFN from severely degraded initial responses to well-defined group delay response required for the targeted radiating angle with a range of 60◦ (-30◦ to 30◦ ) in a linear beamforming antenna array. This algorithm is demonstrated on OBFN fabricated in a standard silicon photonics foundry process. The calibrated OBFN operates at 30GHz and provide 2GHz bandwidth. This fully automatic tuning approach opens the possibility of employing silicon OBFN in real wideband mm-wave wireless communication systems by providing robust operating solutions. All the proposed photonic circuits are implemented using the standard silicon photonic technologies, and resulted in several publications in IEEE/OSA Journals and Conferences

Modeling of devices for gallium-nitride-based integrated photonics

Credited as "the most important semiconductor since silicon (Si)," gallium nitride (GaN) has received a tremendous amount of attention during the past two decades due to its superb material properties. While the wide band gap and high electron saturation velocity make it especially suitable for high-power and high-frequency microelectronics, the ultra-wide spectral coverage by the direct band gaps of aluminum gallium nitride (AlGaN) and indium gallium nitride (InGaN) gives nitride semiconductors a central stage in optoelectronic devices. Various applications such as medical inspection, sterilization, optical storage, solid-state lighting, and the blue-green light sources in full-color displays have made GaN-related devices influential in people’s daily life. Most of the research to date on III-nitride (III-N) semiconductors has concentrated on the growth of novel nano-structures, the epitaxy of high-quality materials, and the fabrication of devices targeting unprecedented performance. Work on the underlying physics, device diagnosis, or even the proposal and design of devices with new functionalities has been relatively scarce. Even though the theory of III-N quantum wells (QWs) is fairly mature, QW structures face overwhelming strain that limits the maximum indium incorporation and generates a high density of threading dislocations. These issues lead to difficulties in extending the emission wavelength to the "green-yellow gap," low device efficiencies and short lifetimes. These undesirable features have been motivating the pursuit of novel III-N active materials, but in fact understanding the fundamental physics beneath these nano-structures plays an equally important role, as it serves as an evaluating or even predicting process for designing new optoelectronic devices. While a great amount of research energy has been focused on exploring GaN’s the effectiveness for photon-generating processes, its capability in photon-manipulating processes has been significantly overlooked. The asymmetric wurtzite lattice actually implies strong optical effects, which, combining with the piezoelectric effect, make voltage-controlled optically-responsive devices possible. Furthermore, taking advantage of the establishing GaN-on-Si technology, such devices can be integrated with high-speed, high-power GaN transistor driving circuitries or even be transferred to other material platforms with a minimal amount of cost. These unique properties not only make GaN a promising material for optical signal processing but also open up an emerging field of "GaN integrated photonics." The first part of this work focuses on the theoretical study of InGaN/GaNself-assembled quantum dot (SAQD) gain materials and corresponding lasers emitting at visible wavelengths. Following a discussion of adopting III-Ns as an active material in the telecommunications wavelengths, the second part of the thesis considers the design of novel voltage-controlled photonic components, such as polarization rotators (PRs) and gratings, for realizing stable polarization-division multiplexing in coherent optical communication systems. The last part of the thesis introduces experimental work on the development of InP-based laser gain chips, which are the most efficient light source in the optical telecommunications window and will be interfaced with the GaN-based photonic elements. It is expected that the model of the InGaN/GaN SAQDs can be extended to study other nano-structures, and the model of voltage-controlled PRs and gratings can contribute to conceptualization and realization of GaN integrated photonics

Monolithic electronic-photonic integration in state-of-the-art CMOS processes

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2012.This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections.Cataloged from student submitted PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references (p. 388-407).As silicon CMOS transistors have scaled, increasing the density and energy efficiency of computation on a single chip, the off-chip communication link to memory has emerged as the major bottleneck within modern processors. Photonic devices promise to break this bottleneck with superior bandwidth-density and energy-efficiency. Initial work by many research groups to adapt photonic device designs to a silicon-based material platform demonstrated suitable independent performance for such links. However, electronic-photonic integration attempts to date have been limited by the high cost and complexity associated with modifying CMOS platforms suitable for modern high-performance computing applications. In this work, we instead utilize existing state-of-the-art electronic CMOS processes to fabricate integrated photonics by: modifying designs to match the existing process; preparing a design-rule compliant layout within industry-standard CAD tools; and locally-removing the handle silicon substrate in the photonic region through post-processing. This effort has resulted in the fabrication of seven test chips from two major foundries in 28, 45, 65 and 90 nm CMOS processes. Of these efforts, a single die fabricated through a widely available 45nm SOI-CMOS mask-share foundry with integrated waveguides with 3.7 dB/cm propagation loss alongside unmodified electronics with less than 5 ps inverter stage delay serves as a proof-of-concept for this approach. Demonstrated photonic devices include high-extinction carrier-injection modulators, 8-channel wavelength division multiplexing filter banks and low-efficiency silicon germanium photodetectors. Simultaneous electronic-photonic functionality is verified by recording a 600 Mb/s eye diagram from a resonant modulator driven by integrated digital circuits. Initial work towards photonic device integration within the peripheral CMOS flow of a memory process that has resulted in polysilicon waveguide propagation losses of 6.4 dB/cm will also be presented.by Jason S. Orcutt.Ph.D

NASA SBIR abstracts of 1991 phase 1 projects

The objectives of 301 projects placed under contract by the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) are described. These projects were selected competitively from among proposals submitted to NASA in response to the 1991 SBIR Program Solicitation. The basic document consists of edited, non-proprietary abstracts of the winning proposals submitted by small businesses. The abstracts are presented under the 15 technical topics within which Phase 1 proposals were solicited. Each project was assigned a sequential identifying number from 001 to 301, in order of its appearance in the body of the report. Appendixes to provide additional information about the SBIR program and permit cross-reference of the 1991 Phase 1 projects by company name, location by state, principal investigator, NASA Field Center responsible for management of each project, and NASA contract number are included

Analysis and design of concave grating-based devices for multi-wavelength optical networks.

This thesis is focused on the analysis and design of concave holographic gratings for applications in wavelength division multiplexed (WDM) optical network devices, such as multi/demultiplexers, routers and channel equalizers. The main advantage of this approach is that a single optical element can perform both functions of dispersion and imaging. However, the design of such gratings for operation in optical fibre communication networks requires the understanding and control of dominant optical aberrations, stray light, and polarization sensitivity. The solution of these problems forms the basis of the work in this thesis. Chapter 1 presents the motivation for the work, describes the major objectives and lists the main original contributions. Chapter 2 reviews related works in the field of WDM optical networks. Different published methods and techniques used for channel separation are described. Chapter 3 describes the analysis of crosstalk in free-space WDM demultiplexers and wavelength routers due to aberrations, diffraction at the aperture, and diffuse scattering from non-uniformities. It is demonstrated experimentally that holographic grating can give background crosstalk as low as -60 dB. Holographic grating-based wavelength routers are shown to be absolutely scalable from the coherent crosstalk point of view, allowing a large number of subscribers/nodes to be interconnected. Chapter 4 presents aberration analysis of concave grating. New general analytic formulae that define the parameters of concave grating mounts providing stationary and superstationary astigmatism are derived. These mounts offer diffraction-limited imaging within operating spectral range of WDM demultiplexers. A novel retro-reflective scheme of demultiplexer with concave grating and convex mirror resulting in double dispersion and large image field is proposed and analyzed. Chapter 5 describes in detail all stages of design and adjustment of an athermal 49-channel demultiplexer. The method for accurate calculation of transmission spectra is developed. Tolerances and environmental stability are analyzed and the experimentally measured performance characteristics of fully packaged device are presented. Chapter 6 presents the design and analysis of 91x91 wavelength router with 0.33 nm channel spacing based on stationary anastigmatic Littrow mount of concave grating. The problem of additional complexity with respect to a demultiplexer relating to the wide field of view in dispersion direction is successfully solved. Chapter 7 describes the design, analysis and experimental verifications of WDM channel equalizer based on concave grating. In chapter 8, novel method of flattening and broadening demultiplexer passband is proposed. The final chapter, presents a summary of the research, and provides suggestions for future work

3D Hybrid Integration for Silicon Photonics

Silicon photonics (SiPh) has emerged as a photonic integrated circuit (PIC) platform, especially for high volume applications. Integrated laser sources, however, remain a challenge. SiPh foundries have existed for more than 10 years but still don’t offer a qualified process with integrated lasers. Direct heteroepitaxy of group III-V materials on silicon is still immature and suffers from reliability issues. Heterogeneous and hybrid integration techniques, however, have been pursued in research and by industry and present a practical near-term solution for laser integration. Heterogenous approaches based on wafer bonding involve the bonding of bare III-V epitaxial material to silicon on insulator (SOI), co-fabrication, and evanescent light coupling. The laser active medium is thermally isolated from the silicon substrate by the buried oxide layer limiting the laser efficiency at high temperature. Hybrid integration approaches, such as the butt coupling of fabricated III-V lasers to SOI waveguides, may address the thermal issue. However, the main limitation for butt coupling is the significant mode mismatch of the waveguides that imposes a strict alignment requirement.In this thesis the novel 3D hybrid integration technique for SiPh, addressing the aspects of thermal performance and alignment tolerance, was proposed and demonstrated for the first time. This approach is based on the flip-chip integration of indium phosphide (InP) reflective semiconductor optical amplifiers (RSOAs) containing total internal reflection turning mirrors for surface emission. Light is coupled to the SOI waveguides through surface grating couplers. This technique yields increased alignment tolerance compared to butt coupling. Flip-chip integration also allows the RSOA chip to be bonded P-side down directly to the silicon substrate. In this way, the heat generated in the active region can dissipate more efficiently in the silicon. 3D hybrid integration can be carried out at wafer level in a backend step for high throughput manufacturing, and also allow for the integration of InP PICs on silicon interposers for large-scale electronic-photonic integration.A tunable laser was demonstrated with 3D hybrid integration demonstrating a side-mode suppression ratio up to 43 dB. Greater than 4 mW of optical power was coupled into SiPh waveguide and more than 20 nm wavelength tuning range was achieved. A linewidth of 1.5 MHz and relative intensity noise of -132 dB/Hz were demonstrated. A low thermal impedance of 6.2 ℃/W was extracted experimentally from a 3D hybrid laser that was bonded to the silicon substrate, demonstrating a factor of three improvement over a laser that was bonded above the SOI layer. To improve coupling efficiency, various advanced silicon surface grating couplers as well as dilute waveguide RSOAs were investigated. Coupling efficiency up to 85\% can be achieved while also maintaining an alignment tolerant implementation