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Journal ArticleDOI

Semianalytical method to study silicon slot waveguides for optical sensing application

01 Oct 2013-Optical Engineering (International Society for Optics and Photonics)-Vol. 52, Iss: 10, pp 107102-107102
TL;DR: In this article, an effective index based matrix method was used to analyze high-index contrast slab and slot optical waveguides, and the results were compared with results obtained from numerical techniques like finite element method, finite-difference time-domain, and beam propagation method.
Abstract: High-index contrast slab and slot optical waveguides have a high index variation both along the lateral and vertical interfaces and are usually analyzed numerically, requiring large computer memory and time. In this article, their analysis is done semianalytically using an effective-index based matrix method. This method, which is computationally very fast, was earlier used successfully for low-index profile waveguide structures only and is now suitably modified for use in high-index contrast structures. The electric field profile of the waveguide structures is plotted and the effective refractive index at different wavelengths is calculated. The results are compared with results obtained from numerical techniques like finite element method, finite-difference time-domain, and beam propagation method and they match very well. The dependence of their different optical characteristics with the waveguide parameters is also studied. These studies will help in obtaining improved sensitivity of slot waveguides for sensing applications.
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated a modification by adding a Si layer beneath a segmented slot waveguide (SSW) and optimizing the hybrid SSW as the core of a sensor to determine the sensor features in terms of the frequency response and sensitivity.
Abstract: Integrated electric-field (E-field) sensors are commonly used devices in E-field sensing. However, distortion in the modulated signal due to high half-voltage ( V π ) and obtaining a low-frequency response are challenging issues in low-frequency AC E-field sensors. The aim of this study is to investigate a modification by adding a Si layer beneath a segmented slot waveguide (SSW) and optimizing the hybrid SSW as the core of a sensor to determine the sensor features in terms of the frequency response and sensitivity. The results of reducing the Si-layer thickness and segment width with high periodicity revealed a high modulation efficiency for very low-frequency AC E-field sensors and simultaneously expanded the minimum limit of detection by incorporating sensors in very small AC E-fields. This study validated the feasibility and efficiency of using a hybrid SSW as the core of highly sensitive low-frequency AC E-field sensors.

6 citations


Cites methods from "Semianalytical method to study sili..."

  • ...tions of the TE0 mode, which is important in analyzing the hybrid SSW using the transverse E-field amplitude along the x-axis.(44) By following the same method, the con-...

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Posted Content
19 Nov 2019
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors explored the impact of waveguide design in photon collection efficiency and indistinguishability of single photon emitters embedded in photonic integrated circuits and proposed an analytical model based in the Green dyadic of the Helmholtz equation for different geometries of the waveguide.
Abstract: This work explores the impact of waveguide design in photon collection efficiency and indistinguishability of single photon emitters embedded in photonic integrated circuits. Transition Metal Dichalcogenides (TMDC) materials have been selected as single photon emitters because their prominent properties for single photon emission: their giant oscillator strength promotes a stronger Purcell effect and their short exciton lifetimes enhances the indistinguishability of photons. We have calculated the photon extraction efficiency and the indistinguishability of a TMDC point-source of photons with arbitrary orientation embedded at an arbitrary location within a SiN waveguide. For the calculation we propose an analytical model based in the Green dyadic of the Helmholtz equation for different geometries of the waveguide, position of the source and orientation. Calculations have been numerically evaluated through finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) simulations showing consistent results. We have found a maximum coupling up to 81% to the fundamental mode when the quantum emitter is placed in the centre of the waveguide and a maximum indistinguishability of 81% when the emitter is placed 10 nm away from the edge of the waveguide. The results help for a better understanding of the coupling of quantum emitters to nanophotonic devices and photonic integrated circuits (PICs).

6 citations


Cites background from "Semianalytical method to study sili..."

  • ...Due to the index contrast between air and waveguide the electric field feels a strong discontinuity at the interface with an amount comparable to the square of the index ratio at the interface [34]....

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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, an optimized segmented slot waveguide was used as the core of a sensor to determine the sensor features that produce useful frequency responses and sensitivity for low-frequency alternating-current (AC) electric-field sensors.
Abstract: The use of integrated waveguide modulators is a common technique in electric-field sensing. However, the distortion in the modulated signal caused by high half-voltage Vπ and the difficulty in obtaining low-frequency responses are challenging issues for the use of low-frequency alternating-current (AC) electric-field sensors. This study investigates the use of an optimized segmented slot waveguide as the core of a sensor to determine the sensor features that produce useful frequency responses and sensitivity. The segmented slot waveguide is optimized in terms of periodicity and segment width to produce low Vπ and electrical bandwidth before testing the sensor sensitivity. The results show that reducing the segment width achieves a low Vπ of 0.32 V and a very low electrical bandwidth of 4.3 kHz. Our study provides evidence of the feasibility of using a segmented slot waveguide as the primary element for highly sensitive, low-frequency AC electric-field sensors.

6 citations


Cites methods from "Semianalytical method to study sili..."

  • ...The overlap integral factor (Γ) was studied for a slot waveguide through the transverse E-field amplitude along the x-axis.(26,27) In this study, we followed the same method to determine the confinement of the TE0 mode inside the slot region and to detect the effect of using different segmented waveguide dimensions (periodicity and segment width) on the horizontal aggregation reflection that reconcentrates the light beam in the overlap area....

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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors developed an analytical model that uses the Green's Dyadic of a 3D unbounded rectangular waveguide to calculate the coupling and the indistinguishability of an ideal point-source quantum emitter coupled to a photonic waveguide depending on its orientation and position.
Abstract: One of the main steps towards large-scale quantum photonics consists of the integration of single photon sources (SPS) with photonic integrated circuits (PICs). For that purpose, the PICs should offer an efficient light coupling and a high preservation of the indistinguishability of photons. Therefore, optimization of the indistinguishability through waveguide design is especially relevant. In this work we have developed an analytical model that uses the Green’s Dyadic of a 3D unbounded rectangular waveguide to calculate the coupling and the indistinguishability of an ideal point-source quantum emitter coupled to a photonic waveguide depending on its orientation and position. The model has been numerically evaluated through finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) simulations showing consistent results. The maximum coupling is achieved when the emitter is embedded in the center of the waveguide but somewhat surprisingly the maximum indistinguishability appears when the emitter is placed at the edge of the waveguide where the electric field is stronger due to the surface discontinuity.

5 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, a compact, dielectric-metal-dielectric surface plasmon polariton (SPP) waveguide is designed that can have propagation lengths as high as several thousand microns.
Abstract: A compact, dielectric–metal–dielectric surface plasmon polariton (SPP) waveguide is designed that can have propagation lengths as high as several thousand microns. The dielectric layers surrounding the metal waveguide are actually periodic layers of different nanometer-sized dielectric pairs. By proper selection of the surrounding layer widths, a device with a controllable effective index and increased compactness can be designed. It can have a propagation loss

3 citations


Cites methods from "Semianalytical method to study sili..."

  • ...Here, the Lorentzian peak is obtained by calculating the excitation efficiency of the waveguide structure using the matrix approach.(30,31) The propagation loss is calculated from the FWHM of the Lorentzian peak as is done in Ref....

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References
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: It is shown that by use of a novel waveguide geometry the field can be confined in a 50-nm-wide low-index region with a normalized intensity of 20 microm(-2), approximately 20 times higher than what can be achieved in SiO2 with conventional rectangular waveguides.
Abstract: We present a novel waveguide geometry for enhancing and confining light in a nanometer-wide low-index material. Light enhancement and confinement is caused by large discontinuity of the electric field at highindex-contrast interfaces. We show that by use of such a structure the field can be confined in a 50-nm-wide low-index region with a normalized intensity of 20 mm 22 . This intensity is approximately 20 times higher than what can be achieved in SiO2 with conventional rectangular waveguides. © 2004 Optical Society of America OCIS codes: 030.4070, 130.0130, 130.2790, 230.7370, 230.7380, 230.7390, 230.7400. Recent results in integrated optics have shown the ability to guide, bend, split, and f ilter light on chips by use of optical devices based on high-index-contrast waveguides. 1–5 In all these devices the guiding mechanism is based on total internal ref lection (TIR) in a highindex material (core) surrounded by a low-indexmaterial (cladding); the TIR mechanism can strongly confine light in the high-index material. In recent years a number of structures have been proposed to guide or enhance light in low-index materials, 6–1 1 relying on external ref lections provided by interference effects. Unlike TIR, the external ref lection cannot be perfectly unity; therefore the modes in these structures are inherently leaky modes. In addition, since interference is involved, these structures are strongly wavelength dependent. Here we show that the optical field can be enhanced and conf ined in the low-index material even when light is guided by TIR. For a high-index-contrast interface, Maxwell’s equations state that, to satisfy the continuity of the normal component of electric f lux density D, the corresponding electric field (E-field) must undergo a large discontinuity with much higher amplitude in the low-index side. We show that this discontinuity can be used to strongly enhance and confine light in a nanometer-wide region of low-index material. The proposed structure presents an eigenmode, and it is compatible with highly integrated photonics technology. The principle of operation of the novel structure can be illustrated by analysis of the slab-based structure shown in Fig. 1(a), where a low-index slot is embedded between two high-index slabs (shaded regions). The novel structure is hereafter referred to as a slot waveguide. The slot waveguide eigenmode can be seen as being formed by the interaction between the fundamental eigenmodes of the individual slab waveguides. Rigorously, the analytical solution for the transverse E-field profile Ex of the fundamental TM eigenmode of the slab-based slot waveguide is

1,716 citations


Additional excerpts

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Journal ArticleDOI
20 Jan 2005-Nature
TL;DR: The experimental demonstration of Raman lasing in a compact, all-silicon, waveguide cavity on a single silicon chip represents an important step towards producing practical continuous-wave optical amplifiers and lasers that could be integrated with other optoelectronic components onto CMOS-compatible silicon chips.
Abstract: With the growing use of optoelectronics in information technology, manipulating light is almost as important as manipulating electrons. Unfortunately silicon, workhorse of modern microelectronics, is next to useless in optical applications. There has been a massive effort to overcome silicon's inadequacies, and ways of coaxing silicon to handle light are under development but a key component — the laser — has been problematic. Last year a silicon laser was produced, but it involved metres of optical fibre. Now workers in Intel's research labs have come up with an all-silicon laser on a single chip. The device is compact and readily integrated with other silicon components. The possibility of light generation and/or amplification in silicon has attracted a great deal of attention1 for silicon-based optoelectronic applications owing to the potential for forming inexpensive, monolithic integrated optical components. Because of its indirect bandgap, bulk silicon shows very inefficient band-to-band radiative electron–hole recombination. Light emission in silicon has thus focused on the use of silicon engineered materials such as nanocrystals2,3,4,5, Si/SiO2 superlattices6, erbium-doped silicon-rich oxides7,8,9,10, surface-textured bulk silicon11 and Si/SiGe quantum cascade structures12. Stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) has recently been demonstrated as a mechanism to generate optical gain in planar silicon waveguide structures13,14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21. In fact, net optical gain in the range 2–11 dB due to SRS has been reported in centimetre-sized silicon waveguides using pulsed pumping18,19,20,21. Recently, a lasing experiment involving silicon as the gain medium by way of SRS was reported, where the ring laser cavity was formed by an 8-m-long optical fibre22. Here we report the experimental demonstration of Raman lasing in a compact, all-silicon, waveguide cavity on a single silicon chip. This demonstration represents an important step towards producing practical continuous-wave optical amplifiers and lasers that could be integrated with other optoelectronic components onto CMOS-compatible silicon chips.

850 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, a silicon-organic hybrid slot waveguide with a strong optical nonlinearity is demonstrated to perform ultrafast all-optical demultiplexing of high-bit-rate data streams.
Abstract: Integrated optical circuits based on silicon-on-insulator technology are likely to become the mainstay of the photonics industry. Over recent years an impressive range of silicon-on-insulator devices has been realized, including waveguides1,2, filters3,4 and photonic-crystal devices5. However, silicon-based all-optical switching is still challenging owing to the slow dynamics of two-photon generated free carriers. Here we show that silicon–organic hybrid integration overcomes such intrinsic limitations by combining the best of two worlds, using mature CMOS processing to fabricate the waveguide, and molecular beam deposition to cover it with organic molecules that efficiently mediate all-optical interaction without introducing significant absorption. We fabricate a 4-mm-long silicon–organic hybrid waveguide with a record nonlinearity coefficient of γ ≈ 1 × 105 W−1 km−1 and perform all-optical demultiplexing of 170.8 Gb s−1 to 42.7 Gb s−1. This is—to the best of our knowledge—the fastest silicon photonic optical signal processing demonstrated. A silicon–organic hybrid slot waveguide with a strong optical nonlinearity is demonstrated to perform ultrafast all-optical demultiplexing of high-bit-rate data streams. The approach could form the basis of compact high-speed optical processing units for future communication networks.

821 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
01 Jan 2009-Nature
TL;DR: An approach to optofluidic transport that overcomes limitations, using sub-wavelength liquid-core slot waveguides, and provides the ability to handle extended biomolecules directly.
Abstract: The ability to manipulate nanoscopic matter precisely is critical for the development of active nanosystems. Optical tweezers are excellent tools for transporting particles ranging in size from several micrometres to a few hundred nanometres. Manipulation of dielectric objects with much smaller diameters, however, requires stronger optical confinement and higher intensities than can be provided by these diffraction-limited systems. Here we present an approach to optofluidic transport that overcomes these limitations, using sub-wavelength liquid-core slot waveguides. The technique simultaneously makes use of near-field optical forces to confine matter inside the waveguide and scattering/adsorption forces to transport it. The ability of the slot waveguide to condense the accessible electromagnetic energy to scales as small as 60 nm allows us also to overcome the fundamental diffraction problem. We apply the approach here to the trapping and transport of 75-nm dielectric nanoparticles and lambda-DNA molecules. Because trapping occurs along a line, rather than at a point as with traditional point traps, the method provides the ability to handle extended biomolecules directly. We also carry out a detailed numerical analysis that relates the near-field optical forces to release kinetics. We believe that the architecture demonstrated here will help to bridge the gap between optical manipulation and nanofluidics.

776 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: A novel silicon waveguide structure for guiding and confining light in nanometer-wide low-refractive-index material is experimentally demonstrated and it is shown that the structure can be implemented in highly integrated photonics.
Abstract: We experimentally demonstrate a novel silicon waveguide structure for guiding and confining light in nanometer-wide low-refractive-index material. The optical field in the low-index material is enhanced because of the discontinuity of the electric field at high-index-contrast interfaces. We measure a 30% reduction of the effective index of light propagating in the novel structure due to the presence of the nanometer-wide low-index region, evidencing the guiding and confinement of light in the low-index material. We fabricate ring resonators based on the structure and show that the structure can be implemented in highly integrated photonics.

678 citations