1.5%-/spl Delta/ athermal arrayed-waveguide grating multi/demultiplexer with very low loss groove design

Abstract

We describe a compact 1.5%-/spl Delta/ athermal silica-based 100-GHz-spacing 16-channel arrayed-waveguide grating (AWG) multi/demultiplexer with a modified groove design for a very low excess loss. We propose new approaches for modifying the shape of the grooves and the arrayed waveguides and optimize the shape modifications for 1.5%-/spl Delta/ waveguides. By employing this modified groove design, we greatly reduced the groove excess loss from 1.9 to 0.4 dB in the 1.5%-/spl Delta/ athermal AWG.