Semiconductor space switches based on multimode interference couplers

Author

Earnshaw, M.P. ; Allsopp, D.W.E.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electron., York Univ., UK

Volume

20

Issue

4

fYear

2002

fDate

4/1/2002 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

643

Lastpage

650

Abstract

It is shown theoretically that selective perturbation by electrorefractive effect of the even-order modes in III-V semiconductor multimode interference couplers gives rise to high-performance optical switching. The calculated performance of the proposed switch is 3.4 GHz/Vmm, compared to 0.85 GHz/Vmm for an equivalent Mach-Zehnder interferometer (MZI) switch. The effects of electroabsorption and dimension variations are analyzed to demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed device

Keywords

electro-optical switches; electroabsorption; light interference; optical couplers; semiconductor quantum wells; III-V semiconductor multimode interference couplers; dimension variations; electroabsorption; electrorefractive effect; equivalent Mach-Zehnder interferometer switch; even-order modes; multimode interference couplers; multiple quantum-well switch; selective perturbation; semiconductor space switches; Couplers; Interference; Optical crosstalk; Optical devices; Optical interferometry; Optical packet switching; Optical sensors; Optical switches; Power semiconductor switches; Quantum well devices;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Lightwave Technology, Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0733-8724

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/50.996585

Filename

996585