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Extraction of the optical properties of waveguides through the characterization of silicon‐on‐insulator integrated circuits

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In the present work, a method to determine the optical waveguide properties of silicon‐on‐insulator (SOI) integrated circuits has been developed. According to the explicit relations between transfer functions of a microring resonator and the waveguide properties the inner optical parameters could be extracted. An increase in accuracy can be achieved by measuring the transfer functions of additional elements, such as a straight waveguide and a directional coupler. It is shown that the developed method allows one to determine the coupling coefficient, damping decrement, Bragg grating coupler efficiency, and waveguide dispersion with high accuracy. The obtained optical waveguide properties are used for modeling the transmission of a Mach–Zehnder interferometer which is used as a control element. The modeling results demonstrate a good agreement with the experimental characteristics. The developed method paves the way to local characterization of large‐scale SOI integrated circuits by using the aforementioned structures as reference elements.
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Received: 22 September 2022
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Revised: 26 January 2023
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Accepted: 2 March 2023
DOI: 10.1002/mop.33675
RESEARCH ARTICLE
Extraction of the optical properties of waveguides
through the characterization of silicononinsulator
integrated circuits
Alexander A. Ershov |Andrey I. Eremeev |Andrey A. Nikitin |
Alexey B. Ustinov
Department of Physical Electronics and
Technology, Saint Petersburg
Electrotechnical University LETI, St.
Petersburg, Russian Federation
Correspondence
Alexander A. Ershov, Department of
Physical Electronics and Technology,
Saint Petersburg Electrotechnical
University LETI, 5 Professora Popova,
St. Petersburg 197022, Russian
Federation.
Email: aaershov@etu.ru
Funding information
Ministry of Science and Higher Education
of the Russian Federation
Abstract
In the present work, a method to determine the optical waveguide properties
of silicononinsulator (SOI) integrated circuits has been developed. According
to the explicit relations between transfer functions of a microring resonator
and the waveguide properties the inner optical parameters could be extracted.
An increase in accuracy can be achieved by measuring the transfer functions
of additional elements, such as a straight waveguide and a directional coupler.
It is shown that the developed method allows one to determine the coupling
coefficient, damping decrement, Bragg grating coupler efficiency, and
waveguide dispersion with high accuracy. The obtained optical waveguide
properties are used for modeling the transmission of a MachZehnder
interferometer which is used as a control element. The modeling results
demonstrate a good agreement with the experimental characteristics. The
developed method paves the way to local characterization of largescale SOI
integrated circuits by using the aforementioned structures as reference
elements.
KEYWORDS
microring resonators, photonic integrated circuits, silicononinsulator technology
1|INTRODUCTION
Silicononinsulator (SOI) is a wellstudied technology
widely used for the complementary metaloxide
seminconductor (CMOS) compatible fabrication of elec-
tronic and photonic integrated circuits. This compatibil-
ity represents the principal requirement allowing for low
cost and largevolume production.
1
The photonic inte-
grated circuits fabricated with the SOI technology utilize
miniature silicon waveguide with a typical crosssection
of 500 × 220 nm
2
surrounded by silicon dioxide. This
geometry allows for a quasisinglemode propagation in
the telecommunication band. High refractive index
contrast typical for the SOI platform provides a small
bending radius and a high density of elements per chip
area. However, high index contrast imposes rigorous
requirements on the waveguide dimensions, even
nanometerscale roughness in the crosssection result
in noticeable variation in the performance character-
istics.
2,3
Combining the CMOS compatibility with high
index contrast makes SOI technology a favorable
platform for the fabrication of highdensity largescale
photonic integrated circuits.
4,5
Low insertionloss levels around 13dB/cm
5,6
in
combination with a very compact design result in various
passive photonic devices (resonators, filters, multiplexers,
Microw Opt Technol Lett. 2023;65:24512455. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/mop © 2023 Wiley Periodicals LLC.
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