Disclosure of Invention
The present invention is directed to overcoming the problems in the prior art and providing a micro-ring resonator and a method for manufacturing the same.
The invention is realized by the following technical scheme:
In a first aspect, the present invention provides a microring resonator comprising a microring structure and a bus waveguide, the material of the microring resonator comprising Al xGa1-x As, wherein x >0.4.
The micro-ring resonator provided by the invention is an integrated O-band micro-ring resonator, has the characteristics of high efficiency, miniaturization and integration, has a considerable quality factor compared with the existing silicon nitride and lithium niobate micro-ring resonator, and simultaneously has the threshold value of generating an optical frequency comb as low as microwatts. The micro-ring resonator of the invention adopts AlGaAs material with Al component more than 0.4, effectively reduces the loss caused by the phenomenon of two-photon absorption (TPA), and improves the generation efficiency and stability of the optical frequency comb.
Specifically, the micro-ring resonator is located on an insulator, the optical field is limited to be mainly distributed in the AlGaAs waveguide, and the micro-ring waveguide has anomalous dispersion in an O band so as to realize the generation of the Kerr optical frequency comb.
Preferably, the number of the bus waveguides is 1-2, and one end of the bus waveguide is input, and the other end of the bus waveguide is output.
Preferably, the micro-ring resonator includes a micro-ring waveguide and a coupling waveguide, each of which is independently at least one of a strip waveguide, a ridge waveguide, or a multilayer waveguide.
Preferably, the radius of the micro-ring resonator satisfies the formula:
Wherein FSR is frequency interval, c is light velocity, R is micro-ring radius, and n g is group refractive index of mode.
Specifically, the radius of the microring resonator may be designed according to the desired frequency spacing.
Preferably, the input end and the output end of the bus waveguide are tapered waveguides with gradually changed widths, the input end is coupled into the micro-ring waveguide through evanescent waves, and the output end is coupled to the lower-layer waveguide through evanescent waves.
In one possible embodiment, the bus waveguide of the micro-ring resonator has tapered waveguides with gradually changed widths at two ends, the widths of the input end and the output end of the bar waveguide are linearly reduced, the input end is coupled into the micro-ring waveguide in an evanescent wave mode, and the output end is coupled into the lower layer waveguide in an evanescent wave mode. Thereby achieving efficient optical coupling.
In a second aspect, the present invention provides a method for preparing the micro-ring resonator, comprising the steps of:
(1) Depositing a layer of Al 2O3 or SiN x on the surface of an Al xGa1-x As layer of a substrate A, and bonding the deposited surface with an integrated photon chip, wherein the substrate A comprises a protective layer and an Al xGa1-x As layer;
(2) Removing the protective layer to obtain an integrated photon chip containing an Al xGa1-x As layer;
(3) And preparing a micro-ring resonator in the Al xGa1-x As layer by photoetching and plasma etching, and integrating the Al xGa1-x As micro-ring resonator on an integrated photon chip.
The preparation method provided by the invention adopts an etching process to etch away the protective layer, solves the problem of higher surface roughness of the AlGaAs layer film with the Al component larger than 0.4, is beneficial to reducing the loss of the AlGaAs waveguide and the micro-ring, improves the quality factor of the micro-ring, and reduces the threshold value for generating the optical frequency comb. The preparation method comprises the steps of providing a substrate, depositing a protective layer, bonding a chip, thinning and etching the substrate, processing a micro-ring structure and the like. The final micro-ring resonator has high quality factor, smaller device volume and higher integration level, and the threshold pump power is low to micro watt level, and meanwhile, the efficiency and stability of optical frequency comb generation are improved.
Preferably, in the step (1), the thickness of the Al xGa1-x As layer is 450nm-550nm.
Preferably, the substrate A comprises a gallium arsenide substrate, an AlGaAs layer with an Al component greater than 0.75, a gallium arsenide layer and an Al xGa1-x As layer from bottom to top.
Preferably, the preparation method of the substrate A comprises the following steps of sequentially obtaining an AlGaAs layer, a gallium arsenide layer and an Al xGa1-x As layer with Al components larger than 0.75 on the surface of a gallium arsenide substrate through molecular beam epitaxy or metal organic compound chemical vapor phase epitaxy.
Specifically, the gallium arsenide substrate is a commercial substrate, in view of the problem that high roughness easily occurs in the preparation process of the existing AlGaAs film with high Al component, an AlGaAs layer with Al component larger than 0.75, a gallium arsenide layer and a target Al xGa1-x As layer are sequentially deposited on the surface of the gallium arsenide substrate, a thin gallium arsenide layer is inserted between the AlGaAs layer with Al component larger than 0.75 and the target Al xGa1-x As layer, and when the protective layer is removed by subsequent chemical wet etching or plasma etching, the roughness of the film surface of the target Al xGa1-x As layer can be effectively reduced due to the high etching selection ratio between different layers.
Preferably, the AlGaAs layer having an Al composition greater than 0.75 has a thickness of 480nm to 520nm and the GaAs layer has a thickness of 45nm to 55nm.
Preferably, in the step (1), the deposition method includes at least one of magnetron sputtering deposition and Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD).
Preferably, in the step (1), the thickness of the deposited Al 2O3 or SiN x is not more than 50nm, and in particular, the thickness of the deposited Al 2O3 or SiN x is 4.5nm-5.5nm.
Preferably, in the step (1), a layer of Al 2O3 or SiN x is deposited on the surface of the integrated photonic chip, and then the deposited surface is bonded to the deposited surface of the substrate a.
Preferably, in the step (1), the bonding method includes at least one of bonding glue bonding and direct bonding.
Preferably, in the step (2), the etching method includes at least one of mechanical grinding, chemical solution etching, chemical wet etching and plasma etching.
Preferably, in the step (2), the protective layer is removed by reducing the thickness of the gallium arsenide substrate by mechanical grinding or chemical solution etching, removing the residual gallium arsenide substrate by chemical wet etching, removing the AlGaAs layer with Al component more than 0.75 by chemical wet etching, and removing the gallium arsenide layer by plasma etching to obtain the integrated photonic chip containing the Al xGa1-x As layer.
According to the invention, the protective layer is stripped layer by layer through a plurality of selective etching processes, and the selection ratio of each layer is large, so that the surface roughness of the Al xGa1-x As layer film can be ensured when the material of the protective layer is removed, the surface quality of the Al xGa1-x As layer film can be effectively controlled, the loss of the micro-ring resonator is reduced, and the quality factor and the optical frequency comb generation efficiency and stability of the micro-ring resonator are improved.
Specifically, firstly, the thickness of a gallium arsenide substrate is reduced by mechanical grinding or chemical solution corrosion, then, chemical wet etching such As citric acid, hydrogen peroxide or ammonia water, hydrogen peroxide is used for removing the residual gallium arsenide substrate, then, chemical wet etching such As hydrofluoric acid is used for removing an AlGaAs layer with an Al component larger than 0.75, then, plasma etching is used for removing the gallium arsenide layer, and more accurate etching control and better surface quality are realized by selective etching, so that an integrated photonic chip containing an Al xGa1-x As layer is obtained.
Preferably, the preparation method of the micro-ring resonator further comprises the step (4) of sequentially depositing Al 2O3 and silicon oxide on the surface of the micro-ring resonator.
Specifically, the step (4) is to deposit a layer of Al 2O3 by ALD, stabilize the defect state generated by etching, reduce the loss of the micro-ring resonator, and deposit silicon oxide on the top to form a cladding layer by a chemical vapor deposition method.
Compared with the prior art, the invention has the following beneficial effects:
(1) Compared with silicon nitride (SiN x) and film lithium niobate (TFLN), the micro-ring resonator has higher refractive index, smaller device volume, higher device density and higher integration level under the condition of realizing the same Free Spectrum Range (FSR).
(2) The micro-ring resonator has the threshold pumping power as low as tens of microwatts and ultra-low, has higher energy efficiency, and is beneficial to reducing the energy consumption of a chip.
(3) The preparation method of the micro-ring resonator solves the problem of higher surface roughness of the prepared film with Al component larger than 0.4 by a process of multiple selective etching, is beneficial to reducing the loss of AlGaAs waveguide and micro-ring, improves the quality factor of the micro-ring and reduces the threshold value for generating optical frequency comb.
(4) The micro-ring resonator is suitable for the fields of high-density optical communication, optical calculation and artificial intelligence, and provides a new solution for the next generation of photon integration technology.
Detailed Description
For a better description of the objects, technical solutions and advantages of the present invention, the present invention will be further described with reference to the following specific examples. It will be appreciated by persons skilled in the art that the specific embodiments described herein are for purposes of illustration only and are not intended to be limiting.
The test methods used in the examples are conventional methods unless otherwise specified, and the materials, reagents, etc. used, unless otherwise specified, are commercially available.
The following description of the embodiments of the invention will be made with reference to the accompanying drawings by way of specific embodiments. Those skilled in the art will appreciate the practice and advantages of the invention based on the disclosure herein.
The drawings are for illustrative purposes only and are not to be construed as limiting the invention. For ease of illustration, certain components in the drawings may be omitted, or not enlarged or reduced according to a general scale, and do not represent the size of the actual device.
The schematic top view of the micro-ring resonator of the present invention is shown in fig. 1, and the present invention provides an integrated O-band micro-ring resonator, wherein the structure in the plane includes a micro-ring structure (101) and a bus waveguide (102), one end of the bus waveguide is an input (103), and the other end is an output (104).
Specifically, as shown in fig. 1, the integrated O-band micro-ring resonator provided by the present invention supports TE fundamental mode input in the bus waveguide 102, and outputs TE mode in the bus output waveguide 102, and the transmission direction of the optical wave mode is from left to right in fig. 1. In this embodiment, pump light is input from a silicon waveguide (105), laser light is coupled into an upper Al xGa1-x As bus waveguide from a lower silicon waveguide in an evanescent mode through a tapered waveguide with gradually changed width in a region 103, the relative widths of the silicon waveguide and the Al xGa1-x As waveguide change from left to right in the region 103 As shown by 107, 108 and 109, the width of the silicon waveguide gradually decreases, the width of the Al xGa1-x As waveguide gradually widens, and the opposite is true in a region 104.
In this embodiment, a method for manufacturing a micro-ring resonator includes the following steps:
(1) Providing a piece of substrate A comprising an Al xGa1-x As (x > 0.4) layer, as shown in the left side of FIG. 2, a piece of integrated photonic chip is provided, wherein the materials from bottom to top are respectively a gallium arsenide substrate (201), a 500nm AlGaAs layer (202) with an Al composition greater than 0.75, a50 nm gallium arsenide layer and a 500nm thick Al xGa1-x As (x > 0.4) layer, as shown in the right side of FIG. 2;
(2) Depositing a layer of 5nm Al 2O3 on both substrate surfaces using magnetron sputtering or Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) (205);
(3) Fixing the upper surface of the substrate a on the integrated photonic chip by bonding glue or direct bonding, as shown in fig. 3 (a);
(4) Reducing the thickness of the gallium arsenide substrate by mechanical grinding or chemical solution etching, and keeping the thickness of 50 μm as shown in fig. 3 (b);
(5) Removing the rest gallium arsenide substrate by using a chemical wet method to selectively etch, wherein the etching solution is citric acid solution, namely hydrogen peroxide=3:1, and etching is stopped until the Al component is larger than 0.75 of the AlGaAs layer, as shown in fig. 3 (c);
(6) Removing the AlGaAs layer with Al component more than 0.75 by using hydrofluoric acid through chemical wet selective etching until the AlGaAs layer is cut off, as shown in fig. 3 (d);
(7) Removing the gallium arsenide layer by utilizing fluorine-based plasma through selective etching until the gallium arsenide layer is cut off to the Al xGa1-x As (x > 0.4) layer, so As to realize the preparation of the Al xGa1-x As (x > 0.4) film layer on the integrated photon chip, as shown in fig. 3 (e);
(8) A photoresist mask for the micro-ring structure and bus waveguide is prepared on the Al xGa1-x As (x > 0.4) film layer by photoetching, as shown in fig. 4 (a), and the micro-ring structure and bus waveguide are formed by plasma dry etching, as shown in fig. 4 (b), finally a layer of 5 nm-thick Al 2O3 is deposited by ALD, and silicon oxide is deposited on the top by chemical vapor deposition to form a cladding layer, thus obtaining the micro-ring resonator (the Al 2O3 layer in fig. 4 is omitted).
Finally, it should be noted that the above embodiments are only for illustrating the technical solution of the present invention and not for limiting the scope of the present invention, and although the present invention has been described in detail with reference to the preferred embodiments, it should be understood by those skilled in the art that the technical solution of the present invention may be modified or substituted equally without departing from the spirit and scope of the technical solution of the present invention.