PLANNING AND LEADERSHIP FOR A BETTER WORLD
PLANNING AND LEADERSHIP FOR A BETTER WORLD Mid-infrared beacons cause molecules to vibrate in distinctive patterns, allowing that substance's composition to be read from its signature. IBM's mid-infrared optical amplifier is designed to boost the signal from these slight vibrations, making these detectors much more sensitive. In theory, if mid-infrared light could be amplified sufficiently, then spectroscopy could be made sensitive enough to diagnose a patient's disease from the molecules in his/her breath.
Today, mid-infrared sensors are used for applications like semiconductor inspection, test and measurement, chemical and petrochemical detection, and homeland security. Unfortunately, the equipment used to sense with mid-infrared wavelengths presently is bulky and expensive. By crafting silicon chips with waveguides, optical gratings, and mixers, IBM Research hopes to lower the price, power consumption, and size of mid-infrared sensors.
The world's first mid-infrared light amplifier was fabricated on IBM's Yorktown Heights, New York-based pilot line in a standard CMOS process, but using the optical photonic structures that were originally designed for telecom optical interconnects. The telecommunications industry uses near-infrared wavelengths of 1,550 nanometers, but IBM bumped this up to the mid-infrared band at 2,200 nanometers to fabricate its optical amplifier.
An artist’s rendering of an
array of silicon nanophotonic waveguides, carrying mid-infrared signals.
IBM's silicon nanophotonic device use nonlinear optical effects such as parametric gain and four-wave mixing to enable all-optical signal processing for functions such as wavelength conversion, signal regeneration, and tunable optical delays. At telecom wavelengths, amplification is limited to a few decibels. On the other hand, mid-infrared optical gains of over 25dB are possible. Such silicon optical amplifiers provide the foundation for a whole range of silicon-based light-processing modules—from oscillators to frequency combs to super-continuum generators.
To achieve the world's first mid-infrared light amplifier, IBM conducted a comprehensive multi-parameter design-space study on its high-performance computers. By carefully crafting the tiny nanoscale dimensions and specifications of its silicon waveguides, cladding refractive index and polarization modes, a single four-millimeter square chip was able to compensate for all internal losses to achieve a 13dB net off-chip amplification. The silicon waveguide core measured 700-by-425 nanometers and was fabricated using silicon epitaxy, deep-ultraviolet lithography, reactive ion etching, and dielectric deposition.
Next, IBM Research aims to add other optical processing blocks on its silicon chip, the first of which will be a resonant feedback loop that will realize a silicon-based, low-threshold, highly portable optical parametric oscillator. Performing the same functions as a laser—but over a broad band, like white light—optical parametric oscillators could boost spectroscopy, sensing, and free-space communication efficiencies, according to IBM.
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