Periodic Reporting for period 1 - NEBULA (Neuro-augmented 112Gbaud CMOS plasmonic transceiver platform for Intra- and Inter-DCI applications)
Période du rapport: 2020-01-01 au 2021-08-31
NEBULA aims to provide the foundations for a common future-proof optical transceiver technology platform with ultra-high bandwidth capabilities offered by a CMOS compatible toolkit and tailored towards meeting performance, cost and energy metrics in both inter-DCI coherent and intra-DCI ASIC co-packaged optics. NEBULA will be investing in the established bandwidth- and energy saving credentials of plasmonic modulator solutions together with the functional digital processing portfolio of neuromorphic optical reservoir computing engines towards painting the landscape of the next-coming disruption in transceiver evolution, tailoring them in System-in-Package prototype assemblies that can intersect with the challenging framework of both inter- and intra-DCI segments. NEBULA target to demonstrate i) a fully-functional 8-channel 112 Gbaud 16QAM C-band transceiver prototype, offering an aggregate capacity of 3.2 Tb/s and requiring just 2.65 W per single 400 Gbps wavelength, providing in this way an energy efficiency of only 6.625 pJ/ bit with energy savings of 93% compared to current 200 Gbps and 19 W-consuming pluggable optics and ii) a fully functional sub-Volt 8-channel 112 Gbaud PAM4 O-band transmitter co-packaged with a data generating ASIC, offering a 1.6 Tb/s aggregate capacity with up to 37% energy savings compared to the estimated power requirements of respective Si-photonic-based co-packaged solutions.
NEBULA aims to achieve the following technological objectives:
1) Turn the low loss Silicon Nitride (SIN) photonic integration platform into a low cost, high-speed versatile transceiver and processing platform for inter- and intra-datacenter applications
2) Demonstrate CMOS-compatible plasmonic resonance-enhanced modulators (REMs) and I-Q modulators on SiN for 112 Gbaud intra-and inter-DC optical interconnects
3) Develop a mechanism for thermal stabilization (plasmonic thermal stabilizer-PTS) of plasmonic REMs
4) Deploy an optical 112 Gbaud coherent optical receiver assisted by optical reservoir neuromorphic processing for operation without electronic digital signal processing
5) Deploy low-cost 112 Gbaud PAM4 electronic chips for energy efficient transceivers
6) Deploy 8-channel arrays of O-band and C-band modulators with flip-chip compatible optical I/O coupler for co-packaged optics
7) Deploy a C-band SiP 8 x 112 Gbaud-16 QAM (3.2 Tb/s) transceiver for inter-DC interconnects
8) Co-package of ASIC and 1.6 Tb/s O-band driverless transmitter for next Generation 50 Tb/s switches
NEBULA aims to achieve the following technological objectives:
1) Turn the low loss Silicon Nitride (SIN) photonic integration platform into a low cost, high-speed versatile transceiver and processing platform for inter- and intra-datacenter applications
2) Demonstrate CMOS-compatible plasmonic resonance-enhanced modulators (REMs) and I-Q modulators on SiN for 112 Gbaud intra-and inter-DC optical interconnects
3) Develop a mechanism for thermal stabilization (plasmonic thermal stabilizer-PTS) of plasmonic REMs
4) Deploy an optical 112 Gbaud coherent optical receiver assisted by optical reservoir neuromorphic processing for operation without electronic digital signal processing
5) Deploy low-cost 112 Gbaud PAM4 electronic chips for energy efficient transceivers
6) Deploy 8-channel arrays of O-band and C-band modulators with flip-chip compatible optical I/O coupler for co-packaged optics
7) Deploy a C-band SiP 8 x 112 Gbaud-16 QAM (3.2 Tb/s) transceiver for inter-DC interconnects
8) Co-package of ASIC and 1.6 Tb/s O-band driverless transmitter for next Generation 50 Tb/s switches
The summary of the main achievements of the project are reported per obective at the first section of the Technical report.