Fabrication and performance-analysis of a planar silica-based cascaded symmetric Y-branch 1 × 8 optical power splitter

Abstract

Fabrication of a planar silica-based cascaded symmetric Y-branch 1 × 8 optical power splitter is described in this study. Post-fabrication, thorough analysis of device-performance is presented in terms of insertion loss, non-uniformity and polarization-dependent loss. The fabricated device is designed based on cascaded Y-branching waveguide, comprising of a linear taper and symmetric S-bend arc branching waveguides. The simulated values of the average insertion loss, non-uniformity and polarization-dependent loss at the wavelength of 1550 nm are found to be 9.37 dB, 0.35 dB and 0.04 dB respectively. However, the above parameters have been measured to be around 17.5 dB, 1.5 dB and 1.8 dB respectively, for the fabricated device at that wavelength. Measured parameters are compared with the simulated results over a wavelength region of C & L band range. Some preventive points to minimize the deviation of the measured values of the parameters from those of the simulated results are also discussed.