title: Broadband modulation of light by using an electro-optic polymer.
abstract: A major challenge to increasing bandwidth in optical telecommunications is to encode electronic signals onto a lightwave carrier by modulating the light up to very fast rates. Polymer electro-optic materials have the necessary properties to function in photonic devices beyond the 40-GHz bandwidth currently available. An appropriate choice of polymers is shown to effectively eliminate the factors contributing to an optical modulator's decay in the high-frequency response. The resulting device modulates light with a bandwidth of 150 to 200 GHz and produces detectable modulation signal at 1.6 THz. These rates are faster than anticipated bandwidth requirements for the foreseeable future.
authors.affiliation: Bell Laboratories-Lucent Technologies, 600 Mountain Avenue, Murray Hill, NJ 07974, USA. markl@lucent.com
authors.forename: Mark
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.forename: Howard E
authors.initials: HE
authors.lastname: Katz
authors.forename: Christoph
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Erben
authors.forename: Douglas M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Gill
authors.forename: Padma
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Gopalan
authors.forename: Joerg D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Heber
authors.forename: David J
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: McGee