1,721,227 research outputs found
Resonant Micro-Opto-Mechanical Phase Modulator Fabricated in Glass by a Femtosecond Laser
No full textInformation encoding on optical signals is widespread in nowadays technology, ranging from optical fiber links in consumer electronic devices to long-distance communications via fiber networks and biological optical sensing. In many of such diverse applications, the adoption of an integrated-waveguide platform is essential to achieve device miniaturization and to scale-up complexity. Additionally, achieving both rapid and low-loss modulation of the optical phase or intensity is of utmost importance to increase system efficiency or enhance sensitivity. These aspects will also be indispensable to enable the transition to a quantum advantage regime [1], through the use of non-classical states of light, which may be particularly fragile
Femtosecond laser micromachining for integrated quantum photonics
Full text linkIntegrated quantum photonics, i.e. the generation, manipulation, and detection of quantum states of light in integrated photonic chips, is revolutionizing the field of quantum information in all applications, from communications to computing. Although many different platforms are being currently developed, from silicon photonics to lithium niobate photonic circuits, none of them has shown the versatility of femtosecond laser micromachining (FLM) in producing all the components of a complete quantum system, encompassing quantum sources, reconfigurable state manipulation, quantum memories, and detection. It is in fact evident that FLM has been a key enabling tool in the first-time demonstration of many quantum devices and functionalities. Although FLM cannot achieve the same level of miniaturization of other platforms, it still has many unique advantages for integrated quantum photonics. In particular, in the last five years, FLM has greatly expanded its range of quantum applications with several scientific breakthroughs achieved. For these reasons, we believe that a review article on this topic is very timely and could further promote the development of this field by convincing end-users of the great potentials of this technological platform and by stimulating more research groups in FLM to direct their efforts to the exciting field of quantum technologies
Dynamic mechanical characterization of two-photon-polymerized SZ2080 photoresist
Full text linkTwo-photon polymerization (2PP) is a material processing technique employed for the production of high-resolution microstructures. The high potential of this technique in the fabrication of structured materials, or metamaterials, has recently attracted significant research interest. To proceed toward real applications, the mechanical properties of the material obtained by 2PP should be known. These properties depend on all the process parameters, which affect the cross-linking between the polymeric chains, and very few results are available in the literature. In this work, we perform a systematic characterization of the elastic properties of femtosecond laser-polymerized SZ2080 (hybrid organic-inorganic photoresist) by combining dynamic experimental tests and numerical simulations on properly designed microstructures. Studying the resonance frequencies of micro-cantilevers, we demonstrate the possibility of tailoring the mechanical properties of the material by changing the laser irradiation conditions. This result paves the way to the use of 2PP for the fabrication of microdevices operating in a dynamic regime with optimized material properties
Analytical modeling of the static and dynamic response of thermally actuated optical waveguide circuits
Full text linkThermo-optic phase shifters allow one to dynamically tune and control the operation of integrated-optics interferometers. They have been demonstrated nowadays in different waveguide platforms, and their reliable functioning has enabled the realization of reconfigurable circuits of notable complexity. The design approach to such devices is often based on finite-element numerical simulations, which provide accurate descriptions of the underlying thermal phenomena, at the price of long computational times. Here, on the contrary, we devise an analytical model for the heat diffusion in a simplified geometrical configuration. The model describes both static and dynamic regimes, and can be conveniently applied both to three-dimensional waveguide devices inscribed by femtosecond laser pulses and to planar lithographic circuits. The accuracy of the predictions of the model is validated with experimental measurements on Mach-Zehnder interferometers with different geometries, realized in both kinds of platforms
Polymeric fully inertial lab-on-a-chip with enhanced-throughput sorting capabilities
Full text linkIn biology and medicine, the application of microfluidics filtration technologies to the separation of rare particles requires processing large amounts of liquid in a short time to achieve an effective separation yield. In this direction, the parallelization of the sorting process is desirable, but not so easy to implement in a lab on a chip (LoC) device, especially if it is fully inertial. In this work, we report on femtosecond laser microfabrication (FLM) of a poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) inertial microfluidic sorter, separating particles based on their size and providing an enhanced-throughput capability. The LoC device consists of a microchannel with expansion chambers provided with siphoning outlets, for a continuous sorting process. Different from soft lithography, which is the most used technique for LoC prototyping, FLM allows developing 3D microfluidic networks connecting both sides of the chip. Exploiting this capability, we are able to parallelize the circuit while keeping a single output for the sorted particles and one for the remaining sample, thus increasing the number of processed particles per unit time without compromising the simplicity of the chip connections. We investigated several device layouts (at different flow rates) to define a configuration that maximizes the selectivity and the throughput
Femtosecond Laser Written Mechanical Micro-Resonators for Integrated Switching and Modulation of Optical Signals
No full textIntegrated photonics is playing an always-increasing role in the development of new technologies and devices, with applications in the fields of optical communications and, more recently, in linear-optical quantum computing and simulations. Actually, the possibility of integrating complex and reconfigurable functionalities inside a small chip allows to develop ultra-stable platforms for the large-scale processing of classical and quantum optical signals [1] , [2]
Modelling Analytically the Dynamic Response of Thermo-Optic Phase Shifters
Full text linkThermo-optic phase shifters are widely adopted to achieve dynamical reconfiguration of integrated waveguide circuits [1], with applications encompassing diverse fields, ranging from free-space beam steering and shaping [2] to quantum information experiments [3]
Laser-Assisted Etching of EagleXG Glass by Irradiation at Low Pulse-Repetition Rate
Full text linkFemtosecond laser micromachining is becoming an established technique for the fabrication of complex three-dimensional structures in glass. The combination of laser writing and chemical etching increases the technique versatility by allowing the fabrication of hollow structures within the bulk material. The possibility to encompass both optical and fluidic components in a single substrate allows us to realize optofluidic devices usable in several application fields. Here, we present new investigations of laser-assisted etching in Eagle XG glass showing good etching conditions at low repetition rates, where thermal effects can be neglected, and low irradiation speeds, which allow for complex microchannel network formation
- …
