Aluminum plasmonic waveguides co-integrated with Si₃N₄ photonics using CMOS processes

Area of Science:

• Optoelectronics
• Nanophotonics
• Integrated Photonics

Background:

• Plasmonics offers strong light confinement and electronic interfacing, beneficial for on-chip interconnects and biosensors.
• Photonics provides low-loss propagation, compensating for plasmonic losses and enabling passive functions.
• Co-integration of plasmonics and photonics is crucial for advanced plasmo-photonic integrated circuits.

Purpose of the Study:

• To demonstrate the co-integration of aluminum plasmonic waveguides with silicon nitride photonics using CMOS manufacturing processes.
• To validate the performance of this hybrid platform for data communication and sensing applications.

Main Methods:

• Co-integration of aluminum (Al) plasmonic waveguides with silicon nitride (Si3N4) photonic waveguides.
• Utilizing standard CMOS manufacturing processes for fabrication.
• Testing data carrying capacity with 25 Gb/s data traffic.
• Evaluating plasmonic propagation in both air and aqueous environments.

Main Results:

• Successful co-integration of Al plasmonic waveguides and Si3N4 photonics on a CMOS platform.
• Demonstrated data transmission capabilities of 25 Gb/s.
• Confirmed plasmonic mode propagation in both air and water-cladded configurations.

Conclusions:

• The developed platform enables the practical deployment of co-integrated plasmonic and photonic structures.
• This technology holds potential for advancing CMOS-based biosensors and on-chip data interconnects.