Design Procedure and Fabrication of Reproducible Silicon Vernier Devices for High-Performance Refractive Index Sensing

Autor: Benedetto Troia, Ali Z. Khokhar, Milos Nedeljkovic, Scott A. Reynolds, Youfang Hu, Goran Z. Mashanovich, Vittorio M. N. Passaro
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2015
Předmět:
Zdroj: Sensors, Vol 15, Iss 6, Pp 13548-13567 (2015)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 1424-8220
DOI: 10.3390/s150613548
Popis: In this paper, we propose a generalized procedure for the design of integrated Vernier devices for high performance chemical and biochemical sensing. In particular, we demonstrate the accurate control of the most critical design and fabrication parameters of silicon-on-insulator cascade-coupled racetrack resonators operating in the second regime of the Vernier effect, around 1.55 μm. The experimental implementation of our design strategies has allowed a rigorous and reliable investigation of the influence of racetrack resonator and directional coupler dimensions as well as of waveguide process variability on the operation of Vernier devices. Figures of merit of our Vernier architectures have been measured experimentally, evidencing a high reproducibility and a very good agreement with the theoretical predictions, as also confirmed by relative errors even lower than 1%. Finally, a Vernier gain as high as 30.3, average insertion loss of 2.1 dB and extinction ratio up to 30 dB have been achieved.
Databáze: Directory of Open Access Journals