2.2 pJ/bit operation of hybrid integrated light source on a silicon optical interposer for optical interconnection

We present the lowest energy per bit operation of a hybrid integrated light source on a silicon chip for optical interconnection considering wall-plug efficiency of a laser diode (LD). We investigated a multi-channel configuration for low power operation of light sources on a silicon substrate in a photonics-electronics convergence system. We confirmed that lower power consumption per channel can be achieved by using an architecture specific to multi-branching configuration with a single LD. We demonstrated 27.9 mW/channel at 12.5 Gbps with an error free optical link, corresponding to 2.2 pJ/bit, of a hybrid integrated light source as part of a silicon interposer.