Integratable all-optical spectral quantization scheme based on chalcogenide–silicon slot waveguide

Abstract

Abstract In this paper, we propose an integratable all-optical spectral quantization scheme based on soliton self-frequency shift (SSFS) effect in a chalcogenide–silicon slot waveguide (CSSW) with a high nonlinear coefficient of 139.47 W −1 /m at 1550 nm and the wide anomalous dispersion regime of 870 nm. With the input peak power of 25 W, the large frequency shift up to 388 nm is achieved in the 5 cm-long CSSW. The quantization results show that the effective number of bit (ENOB) is 2.68-bit with only 0.32-bit difference from the ideal 3-bit resolution. It is believed that the proposed spectral quantizer is CMOS-compatible, and can find important application in the photonic integratable all-optical analog-to-digital converter (AOADC).