Micro optical spatial and spectral elements (MOSSE)

Abstract

Interference transmission filters that have a defect layer incorporated photonic crystal structure provide a narrow transmission notch within a wide stop band. The location and width of transmission notch can be tuned by changing the thickness of the defect layer. In this paper, we propose and implement interference filters with defect layers patterned with diffractive optical elements. The spectral transmission is a function of the local defect layer thickness while the spatial transmission follows contours of equal optical thickness. The novel devices have multiplexed spectral and spatial transmission characteristics. Alternating layers of silicon oxide (SiOx) and silicon nitride (SixNy) were grown onto a clean silicon substrate using plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD). A thick defect layer of SiOx was grown and the wafer was removed from the growth chamber. The wafer was then patterned with charge 2, 8-level vortex structures on a GCA 6300 g-line stepper tool. The devices were interrogated with a collimated beam from a tunable laser source that operates from 1520 nm to 1630 nm. The spectral transmission was measured by separately illuminating each level of diffractive element and the spatial transmission was imaged on to a CCD camera. Spectral transmission peaks whose location varies as a function of level height were obtained. The spatial transmission profiles consist of triangular zones with wavelength dependent orientation. The elements have potential applications in hyper spectral imaging, pupil filtering, and engineered illumination systems.