Integrated Optics in Silicon (NIMSA Seminar)

Silicon is an attractive platform for the integration of optical components because of the mature infrastructure dedicated to the fabrication of silicon microelectronic devices. However, such compact devices also have large scattering loss. In addition, the electro-optic effects are weak in silicon, making it difficult to realize active components. This seminar will describe techniques for fabricating low-loss silicon waveguides, optical filters, low-power silicon PIN diode optical modulators, and high-performance silicon photodiodes using a complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) integrated circuit process. The photodiodes exploit ion-implantation damage to create midgap states that enhance sensitivity at the 1550 nm wavelength. These components are being developed for a high-speed optical sampling system that will be used to implement an analog-to-digital converter.
Michael W. Geis received his B.A. in Physics and M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Rice University in 1970. The Ph.D. degree in Space Physics and Astronomy was received also from Rice University in 1976. He has been involved with semiconductor-on-insulator technology using zone-melting-recrystallization, submicrometer structure fabrication, and dry etching with reactive ion etching, and ion beam assisted etching. He has published ~ 150 refereed papers as well as articles in Scientific American and Nature, given over 50 invited presentations, edited two books, written 6 book chapters, and has ~ 30 patents covering crystal growth, dry etching, chemical concentrators, diamond technology, cold cathodes.