Printed polymer photonic devices for optical interconnect systems

Harish Subbaraman; Zeyu Pan; Cheng Zhang; Qiaochu Li; L. Jay Guo; Ray T. Chen

doi:10.1117/12.2213373

23 March 2016 Printed polymer photonic devices for optical interconnect systems

Harish Subbaraman, Zeyu Pan, Cheng Zhang, Qiaochu Li, L. Jay Guo, Ray T. Chen

Proceedings Volume 9753, Optical Interconnects XVI; 97530Y (2016) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2213373
Event: SPIE OPTO, 2016, San Francisco, California, United States

Abstract

Polymer photonic device fabrication usually relies on the utilization of clean-room processes, including photolithography, e-beam lithography, reactive ion etching (RIE) and lift-off methods etc, which are expensive and are limited to areas as large as a wafer. Utilizing a novel and a scalable printing process involving ink-jet printing and imprinting, we have fabricated polymer based photonic interconnect components, such as electro-optic polymer based modulators and ring resonator switches, and thermo-optic polymer switch based delay networks and demonstrated their operation. Specifically, a modulator operating at 15MHz and a 2-bit delay network providing up to 35.4ps are presented. In this paper, we also discuss the manufacturing challenges that need to be overcome in order to make roll-to-roll manufacturing practically viable. We discuss a few manufacturing challenges, such as inspection and quality control, registration, and web control, that need to be overcome in order to realize true implementation of roll-to-roll manufacturing of flexible polymer photonic systems. We have overcome these challenges, and currently utilizing our inhouse developed hardware and software tools, <10μm alignment accuracy at a 5m/min is demonstrated. Such a scalable roll-to-roll manufacturing scheme will enable the development of unique optoelectronic devices which can be used in a myriad of different applications, including communication, sensing, medicine, security, imaging, energy, lighting etc.

Citation Download Citation

Harish Subbaraman, Zeyu Pan, Cheng Zhang, Qiaochu Li, L. Jay Guo, and Ray T. Chen "Printed polymer photonic devices for optical interconnect systems", Proc. SPIE 9753, Optical Interconnects XVI, 97530Y (23 March 2016); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2213373

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