Nanolayer-transfer method of TiO2 slot layers and its application for fabricating hybrid electro-optic polymer/TiO2 vertical slot waveguide modulators

Abstract

We have presented a alternative soft process named nanolayer transfer (NLT), to fabricate hybrid electro-optic polymer/TiO2 vertical slot waveguide modulators. We have transfered successfully a 100nm thick TiO2 line pattern layer on sol-gel silica cladding layer, and at the same time we have created a line waveguide in sol-gel silica cladding layer with the widths up to 1μm. The sol-gel silica layer is hydrolyzed and cross-linked, creating a SiO2 network with a highly oriented polycrystalline film of TiO2 in which all crystals grow in the main preferential direction. NLT method also enables to control the high refractive index with better crystallization and lower optical propagation loss of transferred TiO2 slot layer, which allows us to have a higher optical mode confinement of EO polymer ensuring the feasibility of the EO device modulators.