Micron Technology Incorporated

Cambrius, Inc.

Dale G Fried

Jean-Francois Viens

James S Foresi

Gurtej S Sandhu

Howard E Rhodes

Guy T Blalock

Vishnu Kumar Agarwal

Michael Hong Lim

Maksim Skorobogatiy

A waveguide and resonator are formed on a lower cladding of a thermo optic device, each having a formation height that is substantially equal. Thereafter, the formation height of the waveguide is attenuated. In this manner, the aspect ratio as between the waveguide and resonator in an area where the waveguide and resonator front or face one another decreases (in comparison to the prior art) thereby restoring the synchronicity between the waveguide and the grating and allowing higher bandwidth configurations to be used. The waveguide attenuation is achieved by photomasking and etching the waveguide after the resonator and waveguide are formed. In one embodiment the photomasking and etching is performed after deposition of the upper cladding. In another, it is performed before the deposition. Thermo optic devices, thermo optic packages and fiber optic systems having these waveguides are also taught.

Waveguide for thermo optic device

A grated waveguide is partitioned into two or more collateral gratings or sub-gratings, such as sidewall gratings, and the gratings are phase offset from each other to obtain a desired perturbation strength of the grated waveguide. Other waveguide parameters, such as the effective indices of modes and the difference in grating strength between modes, are minimally affected by the phase offset. A phase offset is differentiated from a more commonly used phase shift in that a phase shift can be defined as a longitudinal spatial translation of sequential or overlayed gratings relative to each other, whereas a phase offset can be defined as a longitudinal spatial translation of collateral gratings or sub-gratings relative to each other. The phase offset between gratings is also varied along the length of the waveguide to obtain an apodized grating strength.

Phase offset gratings

By judicious engineering of grating parameters such as tooth shape, duty cycle and phase offset, the grating strengths and effective indices of the polarization modes of a grated waveguide are adjusted over a wide range of values to achieve a desired level of polarization sensitivity, or insensitivity. In the typical example, the physical geometry of the grating teeth is adjusted so that degenerate behavior (n=nand &#x3ba;=&#x3ba;) is obtained for two polarization modes; the effective refractive indices and grating strengths are matched for the TE and TM polarization modes. In the current embodiment the sidewall gratings are used in which the tooth profile is selected in order to equalize the grating strength for each polarization mode.

Periodic electromagnetic waveguide structures with controlled polarization properties

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Dedham, MA, United States of America

Dale G Fried