Abstract
We propose and demonstrate an all-optical wavelength routing approach that uses a tuning mechanism based upon the optical gradient force in a specially designed nano-optomechanical system. The resulting mechanically compliant ‘spiderweb’ resonator realizes seamless wavelength routing over a range of 3,000 times the intrinsic channel width, with a tuning efficiency of 309 GHz mW−1, a switching time of less than 200 ns, and 100% channel quality preservation over the entire tuning range. These results indicate the potential for radiation pressure actuated devices to be used in a variety of photonics applications, such as channel routing/switching, buffering, dispersion compensation, pulse trapping/release and widely tunable lasers.
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Acknowledgements
Funding for this work was provided by a DARPA seedling effort managed by Prof. Henryk Temkin, and the DARPA Phaser program.
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J.R. and Q.L. performed the design, fabrication and testing of devices. All authors contributed to planning the measurements and writing the manuscript.
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Rosenberg, J., Lin, Q. & Painter, O. Static and dynamic wavelength routing via the gradient optical force. Nature Photon 3, 478–483 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2009.137
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2009.137