A novel mode selecting switch (MSS) is experimentally demonstrated for on-chip mode-division multiplexing (MDM) optical interconnects. The MSS consists of a Mach-Zehnder interferometer with tapered multi-mode interference couplers and TiN thermo-optic phase shifters for conversion and switching between the optical data encoded on the fundamental and first-order quasi-transverse electric (TE) modes. The C-band MSS exhibits a >25 dB switching extinction ratio and < -12 dB crosstalk. We validate the dynamic switching with a 25.8 kHz gating signal measuring switching times for both TE0 and TE1 modes of <10.9 μs. All channels exhibit less than 1.7 dB power penalty at a 10 bit error rate, while switching the non-return-to-zero PRBS-31 data signals at 10 Gb/s.
We experimentally demonstrate a scalable and broadband reconfigurable multimode demultiplexer/switch (RMDS) for mode-division multiplexed inter-and intra-chip data communication systems. The RMDS exploits a thermo-optically tuned tapered multimode interference coupler, enabling simultaneous transmission of the fundamental and first order quasi transverse electric modes in C-band. It is used as the building block in a mode demultiplexer with −20 dB crosstalk, which can be reconfigured as a mode selecting switch with 10.9 µs switching time. An aggregated bandwidth of 2 × 10 Gb/s is achieved by the parallel transmission of two nonreturn-to-Zero (NRZ) PRBS31 data signals at 10 −12 biterror-rate with 2.8 dB BER power penalty. A 1.55 pJ/bit energy efficiency is estimated for a proposed multimode optical link.
We design a lossless 8 × 8 Silicon Photonics (SiPh)/Indium Phosphide (InP) hybrid optical switch. The design consists of an 8-channel InP gain block for coupling to an 8 × 8 thermally tuned Mach-Zehnder interferometer-based Banyan switch in a passive SiPh platform. The gain block is an array of eight 1300 μm-long semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs). We experimentally verified the InP gain block while the SiPh chip is accounted by replacing it with a loss component. The SOA in line with the optical signal path provides a net gain larger than 25 dB to compensate for the inherently large insertion loss of the 8 × 8 SiPh optical switch. The total energy consumption of the hybrid optical switch in lossless operation mode is 10.44 pJ/bit at 12.5 Gb/s.
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