title: Ultrafast laser fabrication of low-loss waveguides in chalcogenide glass with 0.65 dB/cm loss.
abstract: This Letter reports on the fabrication of low-loss waveguides in gallium-lanthanum-sulfide chalcogenide glasses using an ultrafast laser. Spatial beam shaping and temporal pulse width tuning were used to optimize the guided mode profiles and optical loss of laser-written waveguides. Highly symmetric single-mode waveguides guiding at 1560 nm with a loss of 0.65  dB/cm were fabricated using 1.5 ps laser pulses. This Letter suggests a pathway to produce high quality optical waveguides in substrates with strong nonlinearity using the ultrafast laser direct writing technique.
authors.affiliation: Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylavania 15261, USA.
authors.forename: Ben
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: McMillen
authors.forename: Botao
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Kevin P
authors.initials: KP
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Antonio
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Benayas
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Jaque