Properties of Multimode Optical Epoxy Polymer Waveguides Deposited on Silicon and TOPAS Substrate

• Published in: Radioengineering 2017-04, Vol.26 (1), p.10-15
• Main Authors: Prajzler, V., Neruda, M., Nekvindova, P., Mikulik, P.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Multimode waveguides; Optical planar and rectangular waveguides; Polymer
• ISSN: 1210-2512
• DOI: 10.13164/re.2017.0010

The paper reports on the fabrication and characterization of multimode polymer optical waveguides. Epoxy polymer EpoCore was used as the waveguide core material and EpoClad was used as a cladding and cover protection layer. The design of the waveguides was schemed for geometric dimensions of core 50 μm and for 850 nm and 1310 nm wavelengths. Proposed shapes of the waveguides were fabricated by standard photolithography process. Optical losses of the planar waveguides were measured by the fibre probe technique at 632.8 nm and 964 nm. Propagation optical loss measurements for rectangular waveguides were done by using the cut-back method and the best samples had optical losses lower than 0.53 dB/cm at 650 nm, 850 nm and 1310 nm.