L. O Faolain | Searcharxiv

arXiv2015

Optical performance monitoring at 640Gb/s via slow-light in a silicon nanowire

We demonstrate optical performance monitoring of in-band optical signal to noise ratio (OSNR) and residual dispersion, at bit rates of 40Gb/s, 160Gb/s and 640Gb/s, using slow-light enhanced optical third harmonic generation (THG) in a compact (80 micron) dispersion engineered 2D silicon photonic crystal waveguide. We show that there is no intrinsic degradation in the enhancement of the signal processing at 640 Gb/s relative to that at 40Gb/s, and that this device should operate well above 1Tb/s. This work represents a record 16-fold increase in processing speed for a silicon device, and opens the door for slow light to play a key role in ultra-high bandwidth telecommunications systems.

physics.optics↗

arXiv2013

Room temperature all-silicon photonic crystal nanocavity light emitting diode at sub-bandgap wavelengths

Silicon is now firmly established as a high performance photonic material. Its only weakness is the lack of a native electrically driven light emitter that operates CW at room temperature, exhibits a narrow linewidth in the technologically important 1300- 1600 nm wavelength window, is small and operates with low power consumption. Here, an electrically pumped all-silicon nano light source around 1300-1600 nm range is demonstrated at room temperature. Using hydrogen plasma treatment, nano-scale optically active defects are introduced into silicon, which then feed the photonic crystal nanocavity to enahnce the electrically driven emission in a device via Purcell effect. A narrow (Δλ = 0.5 nm) emission line at 1515 nm wavelength with a power density of 0.4 mW/cm2 is observed, which represents the highest spectral power density ever reported from any silicon emitter. A number of possible improvements are also discussed, that make this scheme a very promising light source for optical interconnects and other important silicon photonics applications.

physics.optics↗