Vacuum annealed cerium-substituted yttrium iron garnet films on non-garnet substrates for integrated optical circuits

Abstract

Polycrystalline cerium-substituted yttrium iron garnet (CeYIG) showing large Faraday rotation (FR) in the near-IR region was grown on non-garnet (synthetic fused silica, Si, and Si-on-insulator) substrates by sputtering followed by thermal annealing in vacuum. The FR of the films is comparable to the single crystal value. Structural characterization, magnetic properties, refractive index, extinction coefficient, surface topography, and FR vs. wavelength were measured and the magnetooptical figure of merit was compared with that of CeYIG films on garnet substrates.