Ultra-Broadband Mode Splitter Based on Phase Controlling of Bridged Subwavelength Grating

Abstract

An ultra-broadband mode splitter is proposed based on the phase controlling of the bridged subwavelength grating (BSWG) waveguides. An asymmetric directional coupler composed of two BSWG waveguides with an identical waveguide-width but two different bridge-widths is introduced to split the TM0 and TM1 modes based on the mode-sensitive phase-matching condition. The proposed mode splitter is optimized by utilizing the 3D full-vectorial finite difference time domain method. The results indicate that the proposed mode splitter can achieve a compact coupling length of 5.75 μm, the insertion losses of 0.41 dB and 0.53 dB, and the mode crosstalks of −19.6 dB and −27.8 dB for the TM0 and TM1 modes, respectively. The broad bandwidths of 430 nm and 372 nm can be achieved with the mode crosstalk of ≤−15 dB for the TM0 and TM1 modes, respectively. The fabrication tolerances are also studied in detail. The proposed mode splitter could be employed for signal selection and routing in the mode division multiplexing networks.