Broadband 10 Gb/s operation of graphene electro-absorption modulator on silicon

High performance integrated optical modulators are highly desired for future optical interconnects. The ultra‐high bandwidth and broadband operation potentially offered by graphene based electro‐absorption modulators has attracted a lot of attention in the photonics community recently. In this work,...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Laser & photonics reviews 2016-03, Vol.10 (2), p.307-316
Main Authors: Hu, Yingtao, Pantouvaki, Marianna, Van Campenhout, Joris, Brems, Steven, Asselberghs, Inge, Huyghebaert, Cedric, Absil, Philippe, Van Thourhout, Dries
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Bandwidths
Broadband
Communities
Devices
Efficiency
Electric potential
electro-absorption
Electroabsorption modulators
Germanium
Graphene
Insertion loss
integrated optical devices
Interconnections
Modulation
Modulators
Noise levels
Optical interconnects
Photonics
Robustness
Silicon
silicon modulator
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Summary:High performance integrated optical modulators are highly desired for future optical interconnects. The ultra‐high bandwidth and broadband operation potentially offered by graphene based electro‐absorption modulators has attracted a lot of attention in the photonics community recently. In this work, we theoretically evaluate the true potential of such modulators and illustrate this with experimental results for a silicon integrated graphene optical electro‐absorption modulator capable of broadband 10 Gb/s modulation speed. The measured results agree very well with theoretical predictions. A low insertion loss of 3.8 dB at 1580 nm and a low drive voltage of 2.5 V combined with broadband and athermal operation were obtained for a 50 μm‐length hybrid graphene‐Si device. The peak modulation efficiency of the device is 1.5 dB/V. This robust device is challenging best‐in‐class Si (Ge) modulators for future chip‐level optical interconnects. Graphene is considered to be a promising material for realizing ultra‐high bandwidth and broadband operation electro‐absorption modulators. However, demonstration of a graphene based modulator combining both properties in a single device is still lacking. In this work, the true potential of silicon integrated single layer graphene modulators is theoretically investigated and a broadband modulator operating at 10 Gb/s is demonstrated.
ISSN:1863-8880
1863-8899
DOI:10.1002/lpor.201500250