Board-to-board and unit-to-unit optical interconnection system

Abstract

The optical beam emitted from the transmitter array is input into the polarization beam splitter, and then turned by a right angle to input the opening portion of the neighboring board. Then, polarization of the optical beam is controlled by the polarization control array device provided on the opening portion to thereby rotate a plane of polarization by 90.degree., then the optical beam is turned by the polarization beam splitter by a right angle to input into the first light deflection control array device which then controls the propagation direction of the optical beam to input into the desired photodetector. On the other hand, the optical beam whose plane of polarization is not rotated by the polarization control array device by 90.degree. passes through the polarization beam splitter along the propagation direction to input into the opening portion of the neighboring board, and is then controlled similarly. The optical beam array emitted from the transmitter array with the lens array which is attached to the lower end portion of the board is received by the light deflection control array device, then the propagation direction of the optical beam array is variably controlled every optical beam to be input into the mirror with a gradient, and then the optical beam array reflected by the mirror is received by the photodetector with the lens array. Therefore, the optical beams from the desired boards can be connected to the photodetector mounted on another desired board. Similarly, the board-to-board free-space optical interconnection system between the boards in a certain unit and a different unit arbitrarily can be provided by introducing the light deflection control array device.