SBIR Phase II: Material Processing for Optimizing the Performance of an Embedded Bragg Grating

这个小型企业创新研究（SBIR）第二阶段项目将使波导的制造在磷酸钛氧钾（KTP）含有布拉格光栅具有指定的光谱和电光特性。 这些特性包括反射率、带宽、中心波长和电光调谐范围。 为了实现这一目标，用于形成布拉格光栅的处理步骤与其产生的光谱和电光特性之间的关系将被完全量化。 控制光谱特性和电光调谐这些光栅的能力将使广泛的新的和商业上有用的设备。 使用所开发的处理步骤，将制造布拉格光栅阵列，其中每个光栅被优化用于稳定激光二极管的波长。 相对于激光二极管平移波导阵列将调谐其波长。这种新的调谐技术与其他调谐技术相比具有显著的技术和成本优势，潜在的商业应用包括用于有源色散补偿的可调谐滤波器，用于波分复用（WDM）的高速分插滤波器，以及用于测试和评估网络组件的宽调谐源。 其他应用包括用于光谱学的稳定激光二极管、播种高功率激光器以及用于低功率氩离子和氦镉（HeCd）激光器的基于倍频二极管的替换激光器。

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project will enable the fabrication of waveguides in potassium titanyl phosphate (KTP) containing Bragg gratings with specified spectral and electro-optic characteristics. These characteristics include reflectivity, bandwidth, central wavelength, and electro-optic tuning range. To achieve this goal, the relationship between the processing steps used to form the Bragg grating and its resulting spectral and electro-optic properties will be fully quantified. The ability to control the spectral characteristics and electro-optically tune these gratings will enable a broad range of new and commercially useful devices. Using the processing steps developed, an array of Bragg gratings will be fabricated with each grating optimized for stabilizing the wavelength of a laser diode. Translating the waveguide array with respect to the laser diode will tune its wavelength. This novel tuning technique will have significant technical and cost advantages over other tuning techniques.Potential commercial applications include tunable filters for active dispersion compensation, high-speed add/drop filters for wavelength division multiplexing (WDM), and a broadly tunable source for test and evaluation of network components. Other applications include stabilizing laser diodes for spectroscopy, seeding high power lasers, and frequency doubled diode-based replacement lasers for low power Argon-Ion and helium cadmium (HeCd) lasers.