Longitudinal 2 x 2 Switching Configurations Based on Thermo-Optically Addressed Dielectric-Loaded Plasmonic Waveguides

• Published in: Journal of lightwave technology 2011-09, Vol.29 (17), p.2636-2646
• Main Authors: Pitilakis, A., Kriezis, E. E.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Applied sciences; Beam propagation method; Circuit properties; dielectric-loaded plasmonic waveguide; Electric, optical and optoelectronic circuits; Electronics; Erbium; Exact sciences and technology; Heating; Integrated optics. Optical fibers and wave guides; Mach-Zehnder interferometer (MZI); multimode interference (MMI); Optical and optoelectronic circuits; Optical switches; Optical waveguides; plasmonic components; Plasmons; Polymers; Switching and signalling; Systems, networks and services of telecommunications; Telecommunications; Telecommunications and information theory; thermo-optic effect
• ISSN: 0733-8724; 1558-2213
• DOI: 10.1109/JLT.2011.2162227

Longitudinal 2 × 2 thermo-optic switches based on dielectric-loaded plasmonic circuitry are thoroughly studied using vectorial numerical tools, i.e., an eigenmode solver and a beam propagation method, implemented with the finite-element technique. The switching configurations studied are based on the Mach-Zehnder interferometer (MZI) and a novel multimode interference (MMI) design. Both components offer improved performance, with respect to comparable microring-based ones, exhibiting larger bandwidth and output port extinction ratio, allowing values up to 30 dB. The reference MZI configuration has better overall performance when compared to the MMI, mainly in terms of available bandwidth.