Design and fabrication of sol-gel microlens array as a fiber-to-fiber and fiber-to-waveguide coupler

Abstract

This paper describes the design and fabrication of a microlens array in photosensitive hybrid sol-gel glass to enhance the coupling efficiency of fiber-to-fiber and fiber-to-waveguide systems. The Code V software is employed in the design and simulation of the microlens array with a theoretical coupling efficiency of as high as 0.18 dB (or 96%). The proposed technique can also be used for the fabrication of thick micro-optical elements in sol-gel materials, and it can open up great opportunities for fabrication of microlenses with a high numerical aperture and thick diffractive optical elements in future.