1. Design and fabrication of two generations of modulator and receiver integrated circuits in a 0.25 um photonic-BiCMOS process available by IHP. Using this process, photonics, opto-electronics and SiGe BiCMOS electronic circuits have been monolithically integrated on chips that occupy a few mm2 of silicon area. ORIONAS transceiver electronic-photonic integrated circuits include DPSK and coherent QPSK modulators and receivers which exhibit dense photonic integration (up to 45 integrated elements) merging the following functions on a single chip: a) spot-size conversion for edge coupling to standard SMF, b) variable optical attenuation, c) phase modulation, d) high-speed electrical driving, e) signal demodulation/mixing, f) balanced photodetection, g) transimpedance amplification and h) thermo-optic tuning. The integrated elements included: a) MMI couplers, b) doped silicon waveguides, c) passive silicon waveguides, d) waveguide coils, e) Ge diodes, f) thermal tuning heaters.
Highlights of the ePIC chip-level testing performed within ORIONAS are: a) Demonstration of SSC structures with losses as low as 1.7 dB when coupled to SMF lensed fiber, b) Ge photodiodes with low dark current (~45 nA) and high responsivity (>0.6 A/W), c) Verification of on-chip VOA and thermal tuning functions
2. AIT of the modulator and receiver ePICs into prototype bread-board model (BBM) sub-assemblies including the following: a) DPSK optical transmitter, b) DPSK optical receiver, c) IQ modulator and d) Coherent receiver.
Highlights of the modulator and receiver BBM testing performed within ORIONAS are: a) Demonstration edge coupled ePIC to standard SMF with coupling losses < 4 dB, b) 28 Gb/s DPSK demodulation and detection using the DPSK receiver BBM, c) 20 Gb/s modulation using the IQ modulator BBM, d) 100 Gb/s QPSK coherent detection using the coherent receiver BBM
3. Design and MAIT of compact radiation resistant high gain optical fiber pre-amplifier built with hi-rel SFF optics, radiation resistant RC-EDF, hi-rel opto-electronics and COTS electronics. The Engineering Model (EM)-level LNOA features credit card footprint and 100gram mass. In terms of optical performance, the LNOA delivers a typical (1550 nm) small signal gain >45 dB. The radiation induced gain drop at 40 krad is >3 dB which was verified through TID testing on the active fibers.
4. Design and MAIT of booster (>20 dBm) Semiconductor Optical Amplifier (SOA) chips using the Semi Insulating Buried Heterostructure (SiBH) process and assembly of the SOAs into compact butterfly packages. The SOA package includes the amplifier chip, TEC elements, the fiber assemblies as well as micro-optics for beam expansion, isolation and collimation within the gold-box module. Two SOAs were assembled into a BBM device for system-level testing. In terms of optical performance, the SOA was measured to deliver >100 mW saturated output power at 2A of driving current and at a typical wavelength of 1550 nm.
