Broadband and high uniformity Y junction optical beam splitter with multimode tapered branch

Experimental characterization of an ultra-broadband dual-mode symmetric Y–junction based on metamaterial waveguides

“…For datacom applications such as mode-division multiplexing [16] or multitarget sensing [17], power splitters with broad bandwidths are required. Different power division architectures have been reported based, among others, on symmetric Yjunctions [18,19], multimode interference (MMI) couplers [20][21][22], inverse tapers [23], adiabatic tapers [24], directional and adiabatic couplers [25][26][27], slot waveguides [28] and photonic crystal structures [29][30][31]. MMI devices offer good fabrication tolerances and compact footprints, and their operational bandwidth can be optimized through geometry design [20,21] or partially shallowly etched regions [22].…”

“…Conversely, this same effect is negligible for the first-order mode, which presents a minimum of its power profile at the waveguide center. Several approaches to optimized Y-junction designs have been proposed to circumvent the effect of the MFS at the tip, including tapered and slotted waveguides [19,27,28], core size optimization [40] or particle swarm optimization algorithms [18]. Nevertheless, ultrabroadband, low-loss and fabrication-tolerant solutions are still sought after.…”

A brief review of design and simulation methodology in silicon photonics

“…The coupling loss between single-mode fibers and photonic chips is 2-3 dB for grating couplers and 1-2 dB for end couplers. High-performance devices, such as power splitters [16][17][18] , polarization splitters [19][20][21] , microring filters [22,23] , couplers [24,25] , modulators [26][27][28][29] , and detectors [30,31] , have been proposed and fabricated with CMOS or Electron Bean Lithography (EBL) technology.…”

High-Performance On-Chip Silicon Beamsplitter Based on Subwavelength Metamaterials for Enhanced Fabrication Tolerance

“…Nowadays, Y-junctions are routinely incorporated, for example, in ultra-high speed, high-quality lithium niobate electro-optic modulators [ 27 ]. Due to the simplicity of its design and operation principle [ 28 , 29 ], we consider these devices to be of special interest for SOI platforms, particularly for applications involving cascaded power splitting (e.g., integrated microspectrometers [ 30 ]. Moreover, Y-junctions with a bimodal stem waveguide offer a strong potential in datacom applications of growing interest, such as mode division multiplexing [ 12 , 31 , 32 ].…”