Silicon photonics has experienced phenomenal transformations over the last decade. In this paper, we present some of the notable advances in silicon-based passive and active optical interconnect components, and highlight some of our key contributions. Light is also cast on few other parallel technologies that are working in tandem with silicon-based structures, and providing unique functions not achievable with any single system acting alone. With an increasing utilization of CMOS foundries for silicon photonics fabrication, a viable path for realizing extremely low-cost integrated optoelectronics has been paved. These advances are expected to benefit several application domains in the years to come, including communication networks, sensing, and nonlinear systems.

All-optical switches have been considered as a promising solution to overcome the fundamental speed limit of the current electronic switches. However, the lack of a suitable third-order nonlinear material greatly hinders the development of this technology. Here we report the observation of ultrahigh third-order nonlinearity about 0.45 cm2/GW in graphene oxide thin films at the telecommunication wavelength region, which is four orders of magnitude higher than that of single crystalline silicon. Besides, graphene oxide is water soluble and thus easy to process due to the existence of oxygen containing groups. These unique properties can potentially significantly advance the performance of all-optical switches.

textTwo distinct stacking orders in ReS2 are identified without ambiguity and their influence on vibrational, optical properties and carrier dynamics are investigated. With atomic resolution scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM), two stacking orders are determined as AA stacking with negligible displacement across layers, and AB stacking with about a one-Received: ((will be filled in by the editorial staff)) Revised: ((will be filled in by the editorial staff)) Published online: ((will be filled in by the editorial staff))

We demonstrate a through-etched grating coupler based on subwavelength nanostructure. The grating consists of arrays of 80 nm  343 nm rectangular air holes, which can be patterned in a single lithography/etch. A peak coupling efficiency of 59% at 1551.6 nm and a 3 dB bandwidth of 60 nm are achieved utilizing the silicon-on-insulator platform with a 1 lm thick buried-oxide layer for transverse electric mode. The performance is comparable to gratings requiring much more complicated fabrication processes. V

In two dimensional (2D) transition metal dichalcogenides, defect-related processes can significantly affect carrier dynamics and transport properties. Using femtosecond degenerate pump-probe spectroscopy, exciton capture, and release by mid-gap defects have been observed in chemical vapor deposition (CVD) grown monolayer MoSe 2 . The observed defect state filling shows a clear saturation at high exciton densities, from which the defect density is estimated to be around 0.5 × 10 12 /cm 2 . The exciton capture time extracted from experimental data is around~1 ps, while the average fast and slow release times are 52 and 700 ps, respectively. The process of defect trapping excitons is found to exist uniquely in CVD grown samples, regardless of substrate and sample thickness. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy measurements on CVD and exfoliated samples suggest that the oxygenassociated impurities could be responsible for the exciton trapping. Our results bring new insights to understand the role of defects in capturing and releasing excitons in 2D materials, and demonstrate an approach to estimate the defect density nondestructively, both of which will facilitate the design and application of optoelectronics devices based on CVD grown 2D transition metal dichalcogenides.

Silicon has been the material of choice of the photonics industry over the last decade due to its easy integration with silicon electronics, high index contrast, small footprint, and low cost, as well as its optical transparency in the nearinfrared and parts of mid-infrared (MIR) wavelengths (from 1.1 to 8 μm). While considerations of micro-and nano-fabrication-induced device parameter deviations and a higher-than-desirable propagation loss still serve as a bottleneck in many on-chip data communication applications, applications as sensors do not require similar stringent controls. Photonic devices on chips are increasingly being demonstrated for chemical and biological sensing with performance metrics rivaling benchtop instruments and thus promising the potential of portable, handheld, and wearable monitoring of various chemical and biological analytes. In this paper, we review recent advances in MIR silicon photonics research. We discuss the pros and cons of various platforms, the fabrication procedures for building such platforms, and the benchmarks demonstrated so far, together with their applications. Novel device architectures and improved fabrication techniques have paved a viable way for realizing low-cost, high-density, multi-function integrated devices in the MIR. These advances are expected to benefit several application domains in the years to come, including communication networks, sensing, and nonlinear systems.

A 16-element optical phased array integrated on chip is presented for achieving two-dimensional (2D) optical beam steering. The device is fabricated on the silicon-on-insulator platform with a 250 nm silicon device layer. Steering is achieved via a combination of wavelength tuning and thermo-optic phase shifting with a switching power of P(π)=20  mW per channel. Using a silicon waveguide grating with a polycrystalline silicon overlay enables narrow far field beam widths while mitigating the precise etching needed for conventional shallow etch gratings. Using this system, 2D steering across a 20°×15° field of view is achieved with a sidelobe level better than 10 dB and with beam widths of 1.2°×0.5°.

Thermoelectric properties of camphorsulfonic acid (CSA) doped conducting polyaniline with different structures have been studied. The sample with special submicron-fibre structure exhibited 20 times higher thermoelectric power factor at 300 K than the sample with general grain structure, which could be ascribed to its higher carrier mobility caused by its higher order of chain packing.