AI-assisted on-chip nanophotonic convolver based on silicon metasurface

Kun Liao,Tianyi Gan,Xiaoyong Hu,Qihuang Gong

doi:10.1515/nanoph-2020-0069

Kun Liao, Tianyi Gan + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1515/nanoph-2020-0069

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Abstract

Abstract Convolution operation is of great significance in on-chip all-optical signal processing, especially in signal analysis and image processing. It is a basic and important mathematical operation in the realization of all-optical computing. Here, we propose and experimentally implement a dispersionless metalens for dual wavelengths, a 4f optical processing system, and then demonstrate the on-chip nanophotonic convolver based on silicon metasurface with the optimization assistance of inverse design. The characteristic size of the dispersionless metalens device is 8 × 9.4 μm, and the focusing efficiency is up to 79% and 85% at wavelengths of 1000 and 1550 nm, respectively. The feature size of the convolver is 24 × 9.4 μm, and the proposed convolver allows spatial convolution operation on any desired function at dual wavelengths simultaneously. This work provides a potential scheme for the further development of on-chip all-optical computing.

Highlights

Compared to traditional electronic signal processing [1], all-optical signal processing has obvious advantages of ultrafast response time, ultralow energy consumption, ultrawide working bandwidth, and ultrahigh operation efficiency [2,3,4,5]
We propose and experimentally implement a dispersionless metalens for dual wavelengths, a 4f optical processing system, and demonstrate the on-chip nanophotonic convolver based on silicon metasurface with the optimization assistance of inverse design
Deep learning has recently been applied to design photonic structures and metastructures, including chiral metamaterial optimization [15], metasurface design for tailored optical responses [16, 17], and light scattering from nanoparticle approximation [18]

Summary

Introduction

Compared to traditional electronic signal processing [1], all-optical signal processing has obvious advantages of ultrafast response time, ultralow energy consumption, ultrawide working bandwidth, and ultrahigh operation efficiency [2,3,4,5]. We propose and experimentally implement a dispersionless metalens for dual wavelengths, a 4f optical processing system, and demonstrate the on-chip nanophotonic convolver based on silicon metasurface with the optimization assistance of inverse design.

Results

Conclusion