HETEROGENEOUS SILICON PHOTONICS

Silicon photonics has a number of advantages that make it interesting for quantum electronics.  Ultralow loss waveguides have been demonstrated on silicon with losses below 0.001 dB/cm.  This enables high Q resonators with Qs of 80 million or higher. Since the linewidth of a semiconductor laser depends on the Q, this means narrow linewidth DFB and widely tunable lasers are possible on silicon.  Interestingly, tunable lasers made with high Q rings, have a mode spacing that varies widely with tuning, which results in interesting properties.  Tunable lasers can be combined with integrated diffraction gratings to make one-dimensional scanners.  Two-dimensional scanners can be made by integrating an optical phased array grating emitter for scanning in the orthogonal direction.  Integration of low loss delay lines with gain elements allows interesting sensors, including gyroscopes and magnetic sensors as well as very stable mode locked lasers.  Reduction in linewidths of passively mode locked lasers by a factor of over 70 have been demonstrated by integrating silicon delay lines, and greater reduction in phase noise and timing jitter are possible with the integration of lower loss silicon nitride waveguides.

Speaker: John Bowers, UC Santa BarbaraF