All-optical switching with low-peak power in microfabricated AlGaAswaveguides |
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Authors: | Espindola R.P. Udo M.K. Chu D.Y. Wu S.L. Ho S.T. Tiberio R.C. Chapman P.F. Cohen D. |
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Affiliation: | Dept. of Electr. Eng. & Comput. Sci., Northwestern Univ., Evanston, IL; |
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Abstract: | We report all-optical switching with low-peak power in a microfabricated AlGaAs waveguide operating at 1.6 μm. We show that by using a 1-μm long microfabricated strongly-guided waveguide with 0.8 μm by 0.9 μm mode cross-sectional area, switching is achieved with an average power of 1.2 mW for 82-MHz mode-locked 430 fs pulses. The estimated peak pump power and pulse energy inside the microfabricated waveguide were ~30 W and ~14.6 pJ, respectively, which is 5-10 times lower than the values needed with conventional waveguides. In terms of a practicality index defined via switching power times waveguide length, this waveguide has around the best value |
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