Heterogeneous Si/III-V integration and the optical vertical interconnect access

Abstract

A new heterogeneous Si/III-V integration and the optical vertical interconnect access to the silicon-on-insulator (SOI) nanophotonic layer is proposed and designed. The III-V semiconductor layers are directly bonded to the SOI layer and etched to form the Si/III-V waveguide (after removal of the substrate), which has no air-trench or SOI channel waveguide underneath as the prior art. The design example shows a 1.5 μm wide Si/III-V waveguide has a confinement factor of ~24% in a 100 nm-thick active region for effective light amplification/absorption. The optical vertical interconnect access is realized through tapering both the III-V semiconductor waveguide and SOI layer in the same direction. Optimization using a simple approximated two-dimensional modal presented gives ~100% coupling efficiency with a 25 μm long optical vertical interconnect access. A three-dimensional finite-difference-time-domain electromagnetic simulation verifies the design numerically and also shows the proposed structure has a good alignment tolerance for fabrication.