MEMS Optical Logic NOR Gate using Integrated Tunable Lasers

This paper presents an optical logic NOR gate constructed by two MEMS tunable lasers and a Fabry-Perot (FP) laser chip. The key idea is that the FP chip is directly controlled by two tunable optical signals via the physical mechanism of injection locking. Compared with other fiber-based gating mechanisms, this logic operation only depends on the optical power without need for accurate phase matching or polarization control. In experiment, the logic NOR function is demonstrated successfully at 100 Mb/s with an extinction ratio of more than 20 dB, and it has a potential to reach higher speed of 10 Gb/s level. The work demonstrates a MEMS single-chip solution for optical logic gates with the advantages of compact footprint, simple optical alignment and easy integration, and may find potential applications in high-speed all-optical communication networks.