SBIR Phase I: Vertical EML Source for High-Speed Interconnects

这项小型企业创新研究（SBIR）第一阶段项目旨在证明高速垂直电吸收调制激光器（V-EML）用于高速互连的技术可行性。这项新技术建立在垂直腔面发射激光器（VCSEL）概念之上，具有低功耗、晶圆上可测试性和二维阵列的可能性等所有标称优势。该技术将消除与高速VCSEL直接调制相关的复杂性。调制将由外部的电吸收调制器完成，该调制器以混合方式或单片方式与VCSEL集成。这种方法允许在速度高于10gbps并轻松达到40gbps的情况下进行干净的调制而不会超调。此外，通过从VCSEL发射中解耦调制问题，它提供了额外的设计自由度，以实现额外的稳定性，更低的噪声和更高的可靠性。这一概念有望通过消除调制速度限制和最大限度地减少光发射机的信号失真，对片对片和板对板互连行业产生强烈影响。在低功率到中等功率的单器件应用中，垂直激光源通常比水平激光源具有成本和尺寸优势。它们也更容易用于二维阵列的制造。V-EML概念进一步消除了这些设备直接调制的限制。通过外部调制，V-EML可以通过更简单的电子设备和更高的速度驱动。这项工作的目的是应用于高速互连。这可以是背板连接，分布式板对板连接或芯片对芯片光互连（C2OI）的形式。被称为“智能像素”的VCSEL阵列已被提出并测试用于此类应用。这项技术的一个主要影响是，它将有助于消除芯片和板的边界，这是数据传输的重大障碍，并将使未来真正的分布式和可扩展系统成为可能。高速互连光通信市场规模预计在2010年将超过90亿美元。

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project proposes to demonstrate technical feasibility of a high-speed Vertical Electro-absorptive Modulated Laser (V-EML) for high-speed interconnects. This novel technology is built on the VCSEL (Vertical Cavity Surface Emitting Laser) concept and has all of its nominal advantages such as low-power consumption, on-wafer testability, and possibility of two-dimensional arrays. This technology should eliminate the complications associated with direct modulation of the VCSEL at high speeds. Modulation will be done externally by an electro-absorptive modulator that is integrated with the VCSEL either in a hybrid fashion or monolithically. This approach allows clean modulation without overshoot at speeds higher than 10 Gbps and easily reaching 40 Gbps. Furthermore, by decoupling the modulation issues from VCSEL emission, it provides additional design freedom for achieving extra stability, lower noise and higher reliability. This concept is expected to strongly impact the chip to chip and board to board interconnect industry by virtually removing modulation speed limit and minimizing signal distortion of the optical transmitter.Vertical laser sources in general have cost and size advantages over horizontal emitters in low to medium-power single-device applications. They also lend themselves more easily to two-dimensional array fabrication. The V-EML concept further removes the limitations of direct modulation from these devices. With external modulation, the V-EML can be driven by simpler electronics and at higher speeds. The application that this work is intended for is high-speed interconnects. This can either be in the form of backplane connections, distributed board-to-board connections or chip-to-chip optical interconnects (C2OI). VCSEL arrays known as "smart pixels" have been proposed and tested for such applications. A major impact of this technology is that it will help to remove the chip and board boundaries as significant obstacles to data transport, and will make possible truly distributed and scalable systems of the future. The high-speed interconnects optical communications market size is estimated to be more than $9 billion in 2010.