Lithium niobate planar and ridge waveguides fabricated by 3 MeV oxygen ion implantation and precise diamond dicing

Abstract

We report on the fabrication and optimization of lithium niobate planar and ridge waveguides at the wavelength of 633 nm. To obtain a planar waveguide, oxygen ions with an energy of 3.0 MeV and a fluence of 1.5×1015 ions/cm2 are implanted in the polished face of LiNbO3 crystals. For planar waveguides, a loss of 0.5 dB/cm is obtained after annealing at 300°C for 30 min. The ridge waveguide is fabricated by the diamond blade dicing method on optimized planar waveguides. The guiding properties are investigated by prism coupling and end-face coupling methods.