Chalcogenide Glasses for Infrared Photonics

The last advances in the synthesis and shaping techniques of chalcogenide glasses suitable for infrared photonics are reported. Ball milling combined with spark plasma sintering allows the preparation of bulk chalcogenide glasses at lower temperature and at lower cost. Microstructuring of optical fibers results in enhanced nonlinear properties leading to the demonstration of low-threshold Brillouin laser at 1.55 μm, all-optical wavelength conversion and time-domain demultiplexing with a 170 Gb/s rate, and supercontinuum between 1.5 and 2.8 μm. The potential of integrated waveguides for functions such as near-IR sensing, mid-IR injection, and (bio)-chemical functionalization is shown.