Integrated acoustooptic and magnetooptic devices for optical information processing

Acoustooptic (AO) Bragg interactions between guided optical waves and surface acoustic waves (SAW´s) and the resulting AO Bragg cell modulators have evolved in integrated AO technology in recent years. A variety of hybrid multichannel integrated AO device modules including power and interferometric RF spectrum analyzers, space switches, tunable filters, frequency shifters and modulators, analog algebraic processors, programmable correlators and other multichannel device modules have been realized in common LiNbO₃ substrate up to 1.0×3.7 cm ² in maximum size. The prospects for realization of their counterparts in monolithic integrated format in a common substrate of InGaAsP material system are also significantly enhanced recently. These AO device modules have shown a high degree of modularity and suggested applications in optical information processing and communications. In the meantime, the magnetooptic (MO) Bragg interactions between guided optical waves and magnetostatic waves (MSWs) in yttrium iron garnet-gadolinium gallium garnet (YIG-GGG) waveguides have resulted in miniaturized MO Bragg cell modulators in analogy with the guided-wave AO Bragg cell modulators. Most recently the performance of such MO Bragg cell modulators has been significantly improved and the modulators have been integrated with ion-milled waveguide lenses to realize hybrid integrated MO device modules, and have been utilized to demonstrate a number of novel applications. In this paper, a review of some of these integrated AO and MO device modules and applications together with some unpublished new results are presented