Silicon Photonics

1
Silicon Photonics

• ISRC Technical Briefing
• November 16th, 2006
• Kenneth Shemroske
• PhD Student
• C.T. Bauer School of Business
• University of Houston
• klshemroske_at_uh.edu

2
Silicon Photonics

• The speed of light, condensed
• Fiber optic communications on the semiconductor
  scale

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Why Silicon Photonics?

• Speed of optical network communications
• Terabits/second
• Speed of microprocessor technologies
• Dual core/multi core processors
• Gigabits/second
• Speed of electrical circuits
• Start to have problems in low Gigabits/second
  range
• As newer, faster microprocessors roll out, the
  copper connections that feed those processors
  within computers and servers will prove
  inadequate to handle the crushing tides of
  data.( Paniccia Koehl, 2006).

4
Background Technology

• Optical communications
• Complimentary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS)
  manufacturing process

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Optical Communications

• Basic components of optical communication
  networks
• Light sources
• Optic fiber
• Light detectors

Photodetector
Fiber optic cable
Modulator
Light source
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Light Sources

• Light Emitting Diodes (LED), Laser Diodes (LD)
• Alignment to fiber optic cables is critical
• Back reflection source of loss
• Modulation
• Direct modulation - On/off
• External modulation continuous wave (CW) source

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Optical Fiber

• Propagate a light signal down its length
• Single mode vs. multimode fiber
• Typical speed is 10 Gigabits per second
• Potential for 20 Terabits per second
• Currently used in business for wide area links or
  within data centers as connections to mass
  storage devices
• Currently carries TV signals and data
  communications to residential customers

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Light Detectors

• Detect the presence of light
• Photodiodes
• Reconstruct the data signal from light pulses
  into electrical signal for further processing

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CMOS Manufacturing

• Making things smaller, faster, and cheaper
• Silicon (Si) based wafer
• Unique properties as a conductor/insulator
• Inexpensive and abundant (made from sand)

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(http//bwrc.eecs.berkely.edu/classes/icdesign/ee1
41_502/lectures/lecture5-manufacturing.pdf)
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Building Blocks of Silicon Photonics
(http//www.intel.com/research/platform/sp/)
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Waveguides

• Si is transparent in the frequency range of
  optical communications
• Use standard CMOS manufacturing techniques
• Produce microchip sized waveguides

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Modulation and Photodetection

• Miniaturized version of modulators on a chip
• Successful in the 10 Gb/s speeds by 2004 (Intel)
• Introduction of Germanium (Ge) to a Si base
• 2006 the first successful SiGe photodetctors
  demonstrated (Intel)

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Low Cost Assembly

• Aligning fiber to the chip
• Current alignment of fibers is active
• Proposed alignment would need to be passive
• Manufactured into the Si base with high precision
  structures

(Intel Technology Journal, Volume 8, Issue 2,
2004)
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Light Source

• Until recently off chip light source with
  active alignment
• High cost, slow manufacturing process
• Mid 2006 Intel and University of California
  Santa Barbara Hybrid Silicon Laser
• Hybrid - Combines Si with Indium Phosphide
  (InP)

(White Paper Research at Intel, A Hybrid Silicon
Laser Silicon photonics technology for future
tera-scale computing)
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Implications

• Computers, Servers, Storage systems
• Continue high speed data processing from source
  to CPU - potential processing in the Tb/s range
• Smaller computers, less heat, elimination of
  motherboards (by todays standards
• High performance for data/computation intense
  applications
• Databases, Enterprise Resource Planning systems,
  geophysical research programs, data mining,
  marketing research
• Large data files
• Video, music, presentation data, multimedia,
  Virtual Reality 2nd Life

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Implications

• Network communication devices
• Routers, bridges, hubs
• Future multiplexing

(White Paper Research at Intel, A Hybrid Silicon
Laser Silicon photonics technology for future
tera-scale computing)
18
Implications

• Other possibilities
• Low cost laser technology for biomedical
  applications
• Real time processing of medical scans at remote
  locations
• High speed links between wireless access points
• Processors and memory chips which function with
  light

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Questions?
?
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References
Herve, Pierre Ovadia, Shlomo (2004). Optical
Technologies for Enterprise Networks, Intel
Technology Journal Optical Technologies and
Applications. Hexus.net (2006). IDF Spring 2005
Silicon Photonics as true Interconnects.
Retrieved October 17, 2006 from
www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item1016redirect
yes Intel Corporation (2006). Hybrid Silicon
Laser. Retrieved October 17, 2006 from
http//www.intel.com/research/platform/sp/hybridla
ser.htm Intel Corporation (2006b). Silicon
Photonics Research. Retrieved October 17, 2006
from http//www.intel.com/research/platform/sp Ko
ehl, Sean (2005). Silicon Photonics Could
Revolutionize future Servers and Networks.
Retrieved October 17, 2006 from
http//www.convergedigest.com/blueprints/ttp03/bp1
.asp?ID242ctgyMarket Matsumomto, Craig
(2005). Luxtera Chases Silicon Photonics.
Retrieved October 17, 2006 from
http//www.lightreading.com/document.asp?siteligh
treadingdoc_id70863 Paniccia, Mario, Krutul,
Victor, Jones, Richard, Cohen, Oded, Bowers,
John, Fan, Alex Park, Hyundai (2006). A Hybrid
Silicon Laser Silicon photonics technology for
future tera-scale computing, White Paper Research
at Intel. Paniccia, Mario Koehl, Sean (2005).
The Silicon Solution. Retrieved October 17, 2006
from http//www.spectrum.ieee.org/print/1915 Pani
ccia, Mario (2003), A New Era in Optical
Communications, Intel Technology Journal, Volume
7, Issue 4. Retrieved October 19, 2006 from
http//www.intel.com/technology/itj/2004/volume08i
ssue02/foreword.htm Pavesi, L. (2003). Will
silicon be the photonic material of the third
millennium?, Journal of Physics Condensed
Matter. Salib, Mike, Liao, Ling, Jones, Richard,
Morse, Mike, Liu, Ansheng, Smara-rubio, Dean,
Alduino, Drew, Paniccia, Mario (2004). Silcon
Photonics. Intel Technology Journal Optical
Technologies and Applications. ScienceDaily LLC
(2006). Breakthrough in Silicon Photonics
Devices. Retrieved October 17, 2006 from
http//www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/06/06062
8234005.htm Sematech Inc. (2006). Semiconductor
Manufacturing Process. Retrieved October 25, 2006
from http//www.sematech.org/corporate/news/mfgpro
c/mfgproc.htm