Organic electro-optic materials

TLDR

Organic electro‑optic activity is governed by chromophore hyperpolarizability, density, and noncentrosymmetric ordering in polymer lattices. The authors use calculations to forecast potential enhancements in organic electro‑optic performance. Organic electro‑optic materials are processable, enabling fabrication of stripline, prism, super‑prism, ring microresonator, and flexible 3‑D devices for wavelength‑division multiplexing, network reconfiguration, and laser tuning. Calculations predict electro‑optic coefficients exceeding 100 pm/V—three times lithium niobate—while low dispersion and refractive indices allow >100 GHz bandwidth devices, and design enables robust, low‑loss materials.

Abstract

Abstract The macroscopic electrooptic activity of organic materials depends upon the molecular hyperpolarizability, beta, of individual organic chromophores and upon the product of number density, N , and noncentrosymmetric order, <cos 3 theta>, of the chromophores in a hardened polymer lattice. Quantum and statistical mechanical calculations provide the basis for rational improvement of these parameters leading to electro-optic coefficients (at telecommunication wavelengths) of greater than 100 pm/V (a factor of 3 larger than values for the best inorganic material, lithium niobate). Such calculations also provide insight into what further improvements can be expected. Owing to low and relatively dispersionless dielectric constants and refractive indicies, organic materials facilitate the fabrication of devices with 3 dB operational bandwidths of greater than 100 GHz. Moreover, robust and low optical loss materials can be fabricated by design. An under-appreciated advantage of organic electro-optic materials is their processability, and a variety of stripline, cascaded prism and super-prism, and ring microresonator devices are readily fabricated. Conformal, flexible, and three-dimensional devices are also readily produced. With ring microresonator devices, active wavelength division multiplexing, optical network reconfiguration, and laser frequency tuning are straightforwardly accomplished.