Physical Mechanism of p-i-n-Diode-Based Photonic Crystal Silicon Electrooptic Modulators for Gigahertz Operation

In this paper, the physical mechanism governing the optical modulation in a p-i-n-diode-embedded photonic crystal (PC) silicon Mach-Zehnder interferometer modulator is examined. Optical simulations have been performed to study how the slow group velocity of the photonic crystal waveguides enables a...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:IEEE journal of selected topics in quantum electronics 2008-07, Vol.14 (4), p.1132-1139
Main Authors: Lanlan Gu, Wei Jiang, Xiaonan Chen, Chen, R.T.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Biomedical optical imaging
Current density
Devices
Electrooptic modulators
High speed optical techniques
Medical simulation
Modulation
Modulators
Optical devices
Optical interferometry
Optical modulation
Optical waveguides
photonic bandgap materials
Photonic crystals
Polycarbonates
Silicon
Simulation
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Summary:In this paper, the physical mechanism governing the optical modulation in a p-i-n-diode-embedded photonic crystal (PC) silicon Mach-Zehnder interferometer modulator is examined. Optical simulations have been performed to study how the slow group velocity of the photonic crystal waveguides enables a significant reduction of device size. The theoretical speed limitation in a PC-based silicon modulator is also explored. The 2-D semiconductor device simulator MEDICI has been employed to analyze the transient behavior of the p-i-n-diode-embedded silicon modulator. Electrical simulations have revealed a significant improvement in modulation speed upon the enhancement of current density in a downscaled PC device. High-speed optical modulation at 1 Gmiddots -1 has been experimentally demonstrated. The performance degradation in optical modulation at the low-frequency operation region attributed to the thermooptic effect is identified and discussed. Simulations have also revealed that the modulation speed of our device can be improved up to 10 GHz by further reducing the device dimensions with little penalty of the increased optical loss.
ISSN:1077-260X
1558-4542
DOI:10.1109/JSTQE.2008.925769