Rare-earth doped aluminum oxide lasers for silicon photonics

Abstract

A reliable and CMOS-compatible deposition process for amorphous Al2O3 based active photonic components has been developed. Al2O3 films were reactively sputtered, where process optimization was achieved at a temperature of 250°C, with a deposition rate of 8.5 nm/min. With a surface roughness of 0.3 nm over a 1 [mu]m2 area, background optical losses as low as 0.1 dB/cm were obtained for undoped films. The development of active photonics components has been realized by use of rare-earth metals as dopants. By co-sputtering aluminum and erbium targets, Er3+ dopants at concentrations on the order of 1.0x1020 cm-3 have been added to the Al2O3 host medium. Resulting Er3+:Al2O3 films have been characterized, and over 3 dB/cm absorption has been measured over a 20 nm bandwidth. Following the material development, distributed Bragg reflector lasers were designed and fabricated in a CMOS foundry. The laser cavity was created by introducing gratings on either side of a Si3N4 waveguide. Er3+:Al2O3 was deposited in SiO2 trenches on top of the Si3N4 layer, eliminating the need for any subsequent etching steps. On-chip laser output of 3.9 [mu]W has been recorded at a wavelength of 1533.4 nm, with a side mode suppression ratio over 38.9 dB.