Polarization demultiplexer based on a silicon nitride-silica-silicon horizontal slot waveguide

Abstract

A compact polarization demultiplexer (P-DeMux) is proposed and characterized to enable wavelength-divisionmultiplexing and mode-division-multiplexing simultaneously. The proposed structure is composed of a microring resonator in ultrathin waveguide and two bus channels in the novel silicon nitride silica silicon horizontal slot waveguides. In the slot waveguide, the transverse electric (TE) mode propagates through the silicon layer, while the transverse magnetic (TM) mode is confined in the slot region. In the designed ultra-thin waveguide, the TM mode is cutoff. The effective index of the TE modes for ultrathin and slot waveguides have comparable values. Thanks for these distinguishing features, the input TE mode can be efficiently filtered through the ultra-thin microring at the resonant wavelength, while the TM mode can directly output from the through port. Simulation Results show that the extinction ratio of the proposed P-DEMUX for TE and TM modes are ∼36.5 and 31.27 dB, and the insertion losses are ∼0.22 and 0.249 dB respectively.