A Versatile Silicon-Silicon Nitride Photonics Platform for Enhanced Functionalities and Applications

Abstract

Silicon photonics is one of the most prominent technology platforms for integrated photonics and can support a wide variety of applications. As we move towards a mature industrial core technology, we present the integration of silicon nitride (SiN) material to extend the capabilities of our silicon photonics platform. Depending on the application being targeted, we have developed several integration strategies for the incorporation of SiN. We present these processes, as well as key components for dedicated applications. In particular, we present the use of SiN for athermal multiplexing in optical transceivers for datacom applications, the nonlinear generation of frequency combs in SiN micro-resonators for ultra-high data rate transmission, spectroscopy or metrology applications and the use of SiN to realize optical phased arrays in the 800–1000 nm wavelength range for Light Detection And Ranging (LIDAR) applications. These functionalities are demonstrated using a 200 mm complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS)-compatible pilot line, showing the versatility and scalability of the Si-SiN platform.

Si Photonics for Practical LiDAR Solutions

“…SiN, commonly found in many CMOS processes, can also act as a waveguiding material in Si photonics. The thickness of SiN layers varies a lot, from a few hundred nanometers to few microns [25][26][27]. In this article we exclude sub-100 nm thick SiN (for ultra-low loss applications [28]) or few µm thick Si (for better polarization and process tolerance management [29]) because they are currently lack of a comparable manufacturing maturity or with vast different design rules that complicates following quantitative analysis.…”

“…These ranges are coarsely summarized from some but not all data in Ref [17][18][19][20][21][25][26][27]…”

Visible-light silicon nitride waveguide devices and implantable neurophotonic probes on thinned 200 mm silicon wafers

“…As foundry-fabricated silicon nitride-on-silicon (SiN-on-Si) photonic platforms on 200 mm and 300 mm substrates for telecommunication wavelengths have rapidly matured in the past several years [1][2][3][4], the opportunity opens to consider extending the manufacturing technology of the SiN waveguides to the visible spectrum. SiN is CMOS-compatible and exhibits broadband transparency that, in principle, extends into the visible spectrum.…”

Analysis of Optical Integration between Si3N4 Waveguide and a Ge-Based Optical Modulator Using a Lateral Amorphous GeSi Taper at the Telecommunication Wavelength of 1.55 µm

“…Moreover, in order to further accommodate a rapid increase in data traffic, the adoption of wavelength multiplexing is considered critical. In these regards, Si 3 N 4 waveguide could be regarded as a promising alternative suitable for wavelength division multiplexing implementation in photonic integrated circuits on bulk Si substrate [19][20][21][22][23]. Due to the relatively-low thermo-optics coefficient of Si 3 N 4 and a moderate refractive index contrast between Si 3 N 4 and SiO 2 , Si 3 N 4 was proposed to be advantageous for wavelength multiplexing in terms of polarization independence, phase error due to fabrication imperfections, temperature stability, and wideband operation for telecommunications applications [23][24][25].…”