Simulation of field-assisted ion exchange for glass channel waveguide fabrication: effect of nonhomogeneous time-dependent electric conductivity

Abstract

Nonhomogeneous time-dependent electric conductivity distribution during field-assisted ion exchange in glass is taken into account in the numerical modeling of optical waveguide fabrication. As an example, the influence of the nonhomogeneous conductivity on a buried channel waveguide is studied in detail. It is shown that there is a substantial variation of electric current density during the process, particularly in the waveguide region. The main difference in comparison to the previous more approximative models is seen to be a smaller refractive index increase for the waveguides.