Roadmapping the next generation of silicon photonics

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Electrical Engineering
• Optoelectronics

Background:

• Silicon photonics has matured into a mainstream technology, primarily driven by optical communication advancements.
• Current integrated photonic devices, especially communication transceivers for data centers, have proliferated from thousands to millions of units.
• Emerging applications in sensing and computing are poised for significant growth.

Purpose of the Study:

• To explore the future trajectory of silicon photonics, aiming for a scale of billions of units shipped.
• To identify critical integration and fabrication bottlenecks hindering broader application proliferation.
• To outline the characteristics of the next generation of silicon photonics and enabling technologies.

Main Methods:

• Analysis of generational trends in silicon photonics, drawing parallels with CMOS technology scaling.
• Identification of key challenges in CMOS-foundry-compatible devices, circuits, integration, and packaging.
• Review of emerging technologies and their potential to address current limitations.

Main Results:

• Silicon photonics faces significant hurdles in scaling production for widespread adoption beyond current markets.
• Next-generation silicon photonics requires advancements in device design, circuit integration, and packaging solutions.
• Emerging technologies offer potential solutions to overcome fabrication and integration bottlenecks.

Conclusions:

• Achieving multi-billion unit shipments necessitates solving fundamental challenges in silicon photonics manufacturing and integration.
• Future silicon photonics systems will likely integrate advanced functionalities for communication, signal processing, and sensing.
• Further research and development are crucial for advancing the silicon photonics ecosystem and unlocking its full potential.