Design, fabrication and characterization of a suspended plate mechano-optical modulator

Author

Nawazuddin, M.B.S. ; de Boer, Maaike ; Berenschot, J.W. ; Ma, K.C. ; Elwenspoek, Miko ; Wiegerink, R.J.

Author_Institution

MESA+ Inst. for Nanotechnol., Univ. of Twente, Enschede, Netherlands

fYear

2013

fDate

20-24 Jan. 2013

Firstpage

560

Lastpage

563

Abstract

A mechano-optical modulator is presented based on the Integrated Optical Nano-Mechanical (IONM) effect [1]. It consists of a light-weight, rigid silicon-nitride suspended plate structure with strengthening ridges and bi-directional electrostatic actuation to maximize switching speed. The mechanical structure and optical waveguide are realized on separate chips and then assembled together resulting in hybrid integration. The latter is made possible by using a self-alignment technique which results in a misalignment error of at most 2 μm.

Keywords

electrostatic actuators; nanoelectromechanical devices; optical waveguides; silicon compounds; IONM effect; SiN; bi-directional electrostatic actuation; hybrid integration; integrated optical nanomechanical effect; light-weight suspended plate structure; mechanical structure; mechano-optical modulator; optical waveguide; rigid silicon-nitride suspended plate structure; separate chips; strengthening ridges; switching speed; Optical device fabrication; Optical filters; Optical modulation; Optical sensors; Optical surface waves; Optical waveguides;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Micro Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS), 2013 IEEE 26th International Conference on

Conference_Location

Taipei

ISSN

1084-6999

Print_ISBN

978-1-4673-5654-1

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/MEMSYS.2013.6474303

Filename

6474303