A study of semiconductor microresonators in chip-scale wavelength division multiplexing (CS-WDM) systems

Unrestricted Micro-cavity devices such as micro-ring resonators are frequency selective elements that can perform a variety of functions such as add/drop filtering, switching, and modulating in chip-scale wavelength-division-multiplexing (CS-WDM) systems. Their compact size and low-power-consuming property have enabled them to become a strong candidate as building blocks in the future photonic integrated circuits (PICs). In this dissertation, InP/InGaAsP-based micro-ring (or micro-disk) resonators vertically coupled with bus waveguides were investigated mainly as active bandpass filters serving as multiplexer/demultiplexers (MUX/DEMUXs) in the WDM communication system.; After a brief review of the existing 8-channel single-pole (first order) DEMUX, theoretical analysis suggested that the filter response could be improved by increasing the order of the filter from first to third, and with reduced losses from the microresonator and the bus waveguides. Device parameters were designed and optimized to meet the required system specifications. Experiments and progresses on the proposed 8-channel multi-pole (third order) DEMUX were presented. Preliminary results indicated an encouraging potential of the new design.