Low bend loss waveguides enable compact, efficient 3D photonic chips
Abstract
We present a novel method to fabricate low bend loss femtosecond-laser written waveguides that exploits the differential thermal stabilities of laser induced refractive index modifications. The technique consists of a two-step process; the first involves fabricating large multimode waveguides, while the second step consists of a thermal post-annealing process, which erases the outer ring of the refractive index profile, enabling single mode operation in the C-band. By using this procedure we report waveguides with sharp bends (down to 16.6 mm radius) and high (80%) normalized throughputs. This procedure was used to fabricate an efficient 3D, photonic device known as a pupil-remapper with negligible bend losses for the first time. The process will also allow for complex chips, based on 10's - 100's of waveguides to be realized in a compact foot print with short fabrication times.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1302.2658,
title = {Low bend loss waveguides enable compact, efficient 3D photonic chips},
author = {Alexander Arriola and Simon Gross and Nemanja Jovanovic and Ned Charles and Peter G. Tuthill and Santiago M. Olaizola and Alexander Fuerbach and Michael J. Withford},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1302.2658},
year = {2013}
}
Comments
9 pages, 6 figures