Mirror quality and the performance of reflective arrayed-waveguide grating multiplexers

Author

Bernussi, A.A. ; De Peralta, L. Grave ; Gorbounov, V. ; Linn, J.A. ; Frisbie, S. ; Gale, R. ; Temkin, H.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Texas Tech Univ., Lubbock, TX, USA

Volume

22

Issue

7

fYear

2004

fDate

7/1/2004 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

1828

Lastpage

1832

Abstract

This paper discusses an investigation of the effects of mirror quality on the performance of reflecting arrayed-waveguide-grating multiplexers. Using specially designed external mirrors as external reflectors, the optimum flatness and microroughness of the reflecting surface are determined. The experiments discussed in the paper indicate that a reflecting-surface flatness of λ/4 is sufficient to obtain high-performance reflective multiplexers. Extrinsic mirror-related phase and intensity errors were found to be negligible for surfaces polished with diamond lapping films with a grain size smaller than 1 μm. These experimental results were found to be in excellent agreement with simulations based on mirror-related changes in the waveguide-grating-length increment.

Keywords

arrayed waveguide gratings; mirrors; multiplexing equipment; optical communication equipment; optical design techniques; optical fabrication; wavelength division multiplexing; diamond lapping films; external reflectors; microroughness; mirror quality; reflective arrayed-waveguide grating multiplexers; surface flatness; Arrayed waveguide gratings; Foundries; Grain size; Lapping; Mirrors; Multiplexing; Optical films; Optical surface waves; Optical waveguides; Silicon compounds; AWG; Arrayed-waveguide grating; WDM; multiplexer; silica waveguides; wavelength-division multiplexing;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Lightwave Technology, Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0733-8724

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/JLT.2004.831196

Filename

1310434