A monolithically integrated optical heterodyne receiver

We demonstrate a monolithically integrated optical heterodyne receiver consisting of an input fiber waveguide, a single frequency distributed Bragg reflector (DBR) laser, a multimode interferometer-based 3-dB coupler, and a pair of semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA)/p-i-n modules using a single epitaxial growth based on asymmetric twin-waveguide (ATG) technology. The input signal was coupled into a fiber waveguide and mixed with the DBR local oscillator laser through the 3-dB coupler, and then coupled into the SOA/p-i-n modules for detection. Using this monolithically integrated optical receiver with a wide-band rectifier narrow-band amplifier receiver, a 3-GHz frequency modulated coherent analog optical link is demonstrated.