Slow-light optical buffers: Capabilities and fundamental limitations
Slow-light optical buffers: Capabilities and fundamental limitations
复制标题
DOI：
10.1109/jlt.2005.853125
复制
发表时间：
2005-12-01
影响因子：
4.7
通讯作者：
Chang-Hasnain, CJ
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Tucker, RS;Ku, PC;Chang-Hasnain, CJ
本文分析了基于慢光延迟线的光缓存器。本文的重点是慢光延迟线，其中的群速度降低使用线性过程，包括电磁感应透明（EIT），人口振荡（PO），和基于微谐振器的光子晶体（PC）滤波器。我们还考虑慢光延迟线，其中的群速度降低了绝热过程的带宽压缩。一个框架的开发比较这些技术，并确定基本的物理限制的线性慢光技术。结果表明，慢光延迟线的容量和延迟带宽积有限。原则上，慢光延迟线的群速度可以趋近于零。但是非常慢的群速度总是以非常低的带宽或吞吐量为代价。在许多应用中，延迟线的小型化是重要的考虑因素。对于所有延迟线缓冲器，对于给定数量的缓冲数据位，缓冲器的最小物理大小最终受到每个存储位的物理大小的限制。我们表明，在慢光光缓冲器中，I B的最小可实现的大小近似等于缓冲器中的光的波长。我们还比较了一系列延迟线缓冲器的能力和局限性，研究了波导损耗对缓冲器容量的影响，并研究了慢光延迟线在许多应用中的适用性。
This paper presents an analysis of optical buffers based on slow-light optical delay lines. The focus of this paper is on slow-light delay lines in which the group velocity is reduced using linear processes, including electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT), population oscillations (POs), and microresonator-based photonic-crystal (PC) filters. We also consider slow-light delay lines in which the group velocity is reduced by an adiabatic process of bandwidth compression. A framework is developed for comparing these techniques and identifying fundamental physical limitations of linear slow-light technologies. It is shown that slow-light delay lines have limited capacity and delay-bandwidth product. In principle, the group velocity in slow-light delay lines can be made to approach zero. But very slow group velocity always comes at the cost of very low bandwidth or throughput. In many applications, miniaturization of the delay line is an important consideration. For all delay-line buffers, the minimum physical size of the buffer for a given number of buffered data bits is ultimately limited by the physical size of each stored bit. We show that in slow-light optical buffers, the minimum achievable size of I b is approximately equal to the wavelength of light in the buffer. We also compare the capabilities and limitations of a range of delay-line buffers, investigate the impact of waveguide losses on the buffer capacity, and look at the applicability of slow-light delay lines in a number of applications.