Polymeric Waveguide Arrays Research Articles

Synthesis and characterization of the properties of perfluorinated copolymer of perfluoro-2-ethyl-2-methyldioxole and perfluoro-n-propyl vinyl ether

A copolymer of perfluoro-2-ethyl-2-methyldioxole and perfiuoropropyl vinyl ether was prepared by the method of high-pressure polymerization. The synthesized polymer has high optical transparency, a low refractive index, and a low material dispersion in the telecommunication wavelength ranges near 0.85, 1.3, and 1.5 µm. In addition, the polymer is predominantly amorphous and has high glass-transition and decomposition temperatures. The synthesized polymer is able to film formation and promising for the design and construction of high-speed optoelectronic printed circuit boards in which a metallic conductor-based electrical data bus is supplemented with an optical data bus based on a polymeric waveguide array. Films with a thickness of 4–8 µm were fabricated from the synthesized polymer by centrifuging. The polymer was characterized by DSC, DTGA, TMA, X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD), and IR spectroscopy.

Polymeric waveguides with embedded micro-mirrors formed by Metallic Hard Mold

In this paper, we presented fabrication of nickel based metal mold with 45 degrees tilted surfaces on both ends of the channel waveguide through electroplating process. To obtain a precise 45 degrees tilted angle, a 50microm thick SU-8 layer was UV exposed under de-ionized water, with repeatable error control of 0.5 degrees . The polymeric waveguide array with 45 degrees micro-mirrors, which is formed by a UV imprinting method with the fabricated metallic mold, shows total insertion losses around 4dB, propagation loss around 0.18dB/cm and 75% coupling efficiency.

Micromachined Photodiode Submount with Integrated Mirror for Efficient Out-of-Plane Coupling to Planar Polymeric Waveguide Circuits

We report on a hybrid coupling concept which allows high-density integration of top illuminated photodetector arrays with planar polymeric waveguide circuits by means of a micromachined submount with an integrated mirror. The etching of a complementary alignment structure in the polymeric layer stack allows passive assembly. The fabrication process of the submount structure is described, focusing on the optimization of the mirroring facet surface quality in order to reduce the effect of topographic scattering. A prototype 8-channel detector module integrated with a straight polymeric waveguide array exhibited an average coupling efficiency of -6.1 dB and a cross-talk value of -21.3 dB between adjacent channels at 1300 nm.