The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Apr. 03, 2001
Filed:
Sep. 17, 1999
Eric B. Grann, San Ramon, CA (US);
L. Curtis Maxey, Powell, TN (US);
U.T. Battelle, LLC, Oak Ridge, TN (US);
Abstract
A wavelength division multiplex/demultiplexer (WDM) has a plurality of narrow-band zeroth order resonant grating filters (,) to multiplex or demultiplex multiple wavelengths that have very close channel spacing. In one embodiment, a plurality of these filters (,) are assembled in a block (,) in parallel and at an angle to a propagation axis to reflect signals for a plurality of discrete frequency channels. The block spacing material (,) can be liquid or solid. In another embodiment, the angular orientation of the resonant grating filters (,) is varied slightly to provide reflected signals for the plurality of discrete frequency channels. Crosstalk between channels can be reduced by reflecting each signal three times. Individual filters can be of binary structure or a sinusoidal grating (,) and can be made using thin film techniques.