title: WDM-compatible mode-division multiplexing on a silicon chip.
abstract: Significant effort in optical-fibre research has been put in recent years into realizing mode-division multiplexing (MDM) in conjunction with wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) to enable further scaling of the communication bandwidth per fibre. In contrast, almost all integrated photonics operate exclusively in the single-mode regime. MDM is rarely considered for integrated photonics because of the difficulty in coupling selectively to high-order modes, which usually results in high inter-modal crosstalk. Here we show the first microring-based demonstration of on-chip WDM-compatible mode-division multiplexing with low modal crosstalk and loss. Our approach can potentially increase the aggregate data rate by many times for on-chip ultrahigh bandwidth communications.
authors.affiliation: 1] School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Cornell University, 428 Phillips Hall, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA [2].
authors.forename: Lian-Wee
authors.initials: LW
authors.lastname: Luo
authors.affiliation: 1] Department of Electrical Engineering, Columbia University, 500 West 120th Street, New York, New York 10027, USA [2].
authors.forename: Noam
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ophir
authors.affiliation: Department of Electrical Engineering, Columbia University, 500 West 120th Street, New York, New York 10027, USA.
authors.forename: Christine P
authors.initials: CP
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Cornell University, 428 Phillips Hall, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Lucas H
authors.initials: LH
authors.lastname: Gabrielli
authors.affiliation: School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Cornell University, 428 Phillips Hall, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Carl B
authors.initials: CB
authors.lastname: Poitras
authors.affiliation: Department of Electrical Engineering, Columbia University, 500 West 120th Street, New York, New York 10027, USA.
authors.forename: Keren
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Bergmen
authors.affiliation: 1] School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Cornell University, 428 Phillips Hall, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA [2] Kavli Institute at Cornell for Nanoscale Science, Cornell University, 420 Physical Sciences Building, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Michal
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lipson