Highly Reliable Flexible Active Optical Links

Author

Bosman, Erwin ; Van Steenberge, Geert ; Van Hoe, Bram ; Missinne, Jeroen ; Vanfleteren, Jan ; Van Daele, Peter

Author_Institution

CMST Microsyst. (Centre for Microsyst. Technol.), Ghent Univ., Ghent, Belgium

Volume

22

Issue

5

fYear

2010

fDate

3/1/2010 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

287

Lastpage

289

Abstract

We present a process to embed commercially available optical material layers into a flexible foil. Patterning of the embedded layers results in highly transparent low loss flexible waveguides. Bending of the foil down to a bending radius of 5 mm causes no additional optical propagation losses. Vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser diodes (VCSELs) and photodiodes are thinned down to 20 ??m and embedded inside the cladding layer of the waveguides. They are optically coupled with the use of embedded micro-mirrors. The result is a thin foil of 150- ??m thickness with embedded active optical low-loss links. Accelerated aging tests prove the reliability of the embedded optical links exposed to humidity and temperature cycling.

Keywords

micromirrors; optical couplers; optical links; optical materials; optical waveguides; photodiodes; reliability; surface emitting lasers; accelerated aging tests; active optical links; embedded layers; embedded micromirrors; flexible foil; flexible waveguides; optical coupler; optical material layers; reliability; size 150 mum; vertical cavity surface emitting laser diodes photodiodes; Embedding; flexible; optical interconnect; optical waveguide; reliability;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Photonics Technology Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

1041-1135

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/LPT.2009.2038797

Filename

5378595