Monolithically integrating photonic and microfluidic devices using a self-aligned process

In this work, we present a novel technology to monolithically integrate buried heterostructure (BH) waveguides with microfluidic channels in a self-aligned manner such that a perfect alignment between the waveguides and microfluidic channels is guaranteed. The feature of self-alignment allows efficient optical coupling between the channels and waveguides, thus enables remote excitation and detection of fluorescent and light scattering objects.