Ultrafast Electro-Optic Spatial Light Modulators on Silicon

硅基超快电光空间光调制器

• 批准号: 1308014
• 负责人: Jacob Robinson
• 金额: $ 35.98万
• 依托单位: William Marsh Rice University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2013
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2013-09-01 至 2016-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1308014&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Ultrafast; Electro; Optic; Spatial; Light

The objective of this research is to develop highly-integrated and ultrafast spatial light modulators on the silicon nanophotonic platform. This modulator will have a high modulation speed over 10 Gbit/s and a low power consumption below 0.2 pJ/bit, and it can be manufactured at low cost by commercial silicon microelectronics foundries. The approach is based on a novel perturbation-induced diffractive coupling between the highly-confined optical mode in an integrated resonator and the normal-incidence free-space waves. Silicon photonic-crystal cavities will be employed, which have embedded p-i-n junctions for electro-optic resonance tuning that leads to amplitude or phase modulations of normal-incidence laser beams. The proposed research demonstrates an entirely new way to optically access the integrated optical resonators. This novel coupling scheme allows two-dimensional (2D) planar photonic circuits to manipulate the propagation of normal-incidence optical beams, which bridges the gap between the fast-developing integrated photonics technology and conventional 3D optical systems. The proposed device has the unique combination of high data bandwidth and high integration capability. As the key element in a free-space optical system, this device can potentially revive the interest in free-space optical signal and data processing, which has been hindered by the speed of SLMs in the past. The proposed research will be closely integrated with classroom teaching and outreach activities where students learn through examples from this project. Demonstrating the wide range of applications of silicon photonics can help to attract or retain students, especially female and minority students, to this field.

本研究的目标是在硅纳米光子平台上开发高集成度、超快的空间光调制器。该调制器具有10 Gbit/s以上的高调制速度和0.2pJ/bit以下的低功耗，并且可以由商业硅微电子代工厂以低成本制造。该方法是基于一种新的微扰诱导的衍射耦合之间的高度限制的光学模式在集成谐振腔和垂直入射的自由空间波。硅光子晶体腔将被采用，它具有嵌入式p-i-n结，用于电光谐振调谐，导致垂直入射激光束的振幅或相位调制。所提出的研究展示了一种全新的方式来光学访问集成光学谐振器。这种新颖的耦合方案允许二维（2D）平面光子电路操纵垂直入射光束的传播，这弥合了快速发展的集成光子技术和传统3D光学系统之间的差距。所提出的器件具有高数据带宽和高集成能力的独特组合。作为自由空间光学系统中的关键元件，该器件可以潜在地恢复对自由空间光信号和数据处理的兴趣，这在过去一直受到SLM速度的阻碍。拟议的研究将与课堂教学和外展活动紧密结合，学生通过该项目的例子学习。展示硅光子学的广泛应用有助于吸引或留住学生，特别是女性和少数民族学生。