Non-Volatile Programmable Ultra-Small Photonic Arbitrary Power Splitters

• Published in: Nanomaterials (Basel, Switzerland) Switzerland), 2022-02, Vol.12 (4), p.669
• Main Authors: Yuan, Huan, Wu, Jiagui, Zhang, Jinping, Pu, Xun, Zhang, Zhenfu, Yu, Yang, Yang, Junbo
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Algorithms; Amorphous materials; arbitrary power splitter; C band; Design techniques; digital nanophotonics; Hybrid structures; Integrated circuits; inverse design; Light; Optoelectronics; phase change material; Phase change materials; Phase transitions; Photonics; Point defects; Power splitters; Silicon; Three dimensional analysis; Volatility
• ISSN: 2079-4991; 2079-4991
• DOI: 10.3390/nano12040669

A series of reconfigurable compact photonic arbitrary power splitters are proposed based on the hybrid structure of silicon and Ge Sb Se Te (GSST), which is a new kind of non-volatile optical phase change material (O-PCM) with low absorption. Our pixelated meta-hybrid has an extremely small photonic integrated circuit (PIC) footprint with a size comparable to that of the most advanced electronic integrated circuits (EICs). The power-split ratio can be reconfigured in a completely digital manner through the amorphous and crystalline switching of the GSST material, which only coated less than one-fifth of the pattern allocation area. The target power-split ratio between the output channels can be arbitrarily reconfigured digitally with high precision and in the valuable C-band (1530-1560 nm) based on the analysis of three-dimensional finite-difference time-domain. The 1 × 2, 1 × 3, and 1 × 4 splitting configurations were all investigated with a variety of power-split ratios for each case, and the corresponding true value tables of GSST distribution are given. These non-volatile hybrid photonic splitters offer the advantages of an extremely small footprint and non-volatile digital programmability, which are favorable to the truly optoelectronic fusion chip.