Abstract
After dominating the electronics industry for decades, silicon is
on the verge of becoming the material of choice for the photonics
industry: the traditional stronghold of III-V semiconductors. Stimulated
by a series of recent breakthroughs and propelled by increasing investments
by governments and the private sector, silicon photonics is now the
most active discipline within the field of integrated optics. This
paper provides an overview of the state of the art in silicon photonics
and outlines challenges that must be overcome before large-scale
commercialization can occur. In particular, for realization of integration
with CMOS very large scale integration (VLSI), silicon photonics
must be compatible with the economics of silicon manufacturing and
must operate within thermal constraints of VLSI chips. The impact
of silicon photonics will reach beyond optical communication-its
traditionally anticipated application. Silicon has excellent linear
and nonlinear optical properties in the midwave infrared (IR) spectrum.
These properties, along with silicon's excellent thermal conductivity
and optical damage threshold, open up the possibility for a new class
of mid-IR photonic devices
- circuits,
- cmos
- communication,
- conductivity,
- conductivitycmos
- constraints
- damage
- device,
- elemental
- iii-v
- industry,
- infrared
- integrated
- integration,
- large
- linear
- manufacturing,
- materials,
- midinfrared
- midwave
- nonlinear
- optical
- optics,
- optoelectronics,
- photonic
- photonics
- photonics,
- properties,
- scale
- semiconductors,
- si,
- silicon
- silicon,
- spectra,
- spectrum,
- thermal
- threshold,
- very
- vlsi,
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