Silica-on-Silicon

Many of our PIC products rely on our Silica-on-Silicon PLC technology. We have developed a broad toolbox of device elements that provide a variety of optical functions on a single silicon chip. The planar processing enables scalable, high volume production along with high performance and reliability. We use bulk and thin film capabilities to manufacture our own glass materials on the silicon wafer substrate. By intentionally incorporating impurities, such as Germanium, Boron or Phosphorus into the Silica waveguides for the purpose of modifying its optical properties in a controlled manner, a process known as ‘‘doping’’, we can create material structures for lowest optical power loss, highest levels of integration as well as material that provides optical gain or amplification. In order to achieve a specific functionality, we can vary these doping levels precisely across the wafer and are able to integrate different elements into optical circuits on a single chip. We routinely utilize micron and submicron scale structures of multiple precision-doped Silica-on-Silicon PLCs to manufacture and integrate into optical circuits design elements and building blocks for low loss coupling between different waveguides, Wavelength Division Multiplexer, or WDM, couplers, splitters, turning mirrors to couple light out of the PLC chip into a photo-detector, DWDM and course wavelength division multiplexing, or CWDM, arrayed waveguide gratings, or AWG, multiplexer and de-multiplexer.