All polymer asymmetric Mach-Zehnder interferometer waveguide sensor by imprinting bonding and laser polishing

We present an all polymer asymmetric Mach-Zehnder interferometer （AMZI） waveguide sensor based on imprinting bonding and laser polishing method. The fabrication methods are compatible with high accuracy waveguide sensing structure. The rectangle waveguide structure of this sensor has three sensing surfaces contacting the test media, and its sensing accuracy can be increased 5 times compared with that of one surface sensing structure. An AMZI device structure is designed. The single mode condition, the length of the sensing arm, and the length deviation between the sensing arm and the reference arm are optimized. The length deviation is optimized to be 19.8 μm in a refractive index range between 1.470 and 1.545. We fabricate the AMZI waveguide by lithography and wet etching method. The imprinting bonding and laser polishing method is proposed and investigated. The insertion loss is between-80.36 dB and-10.63 dB. The average and linear sensitivity are 768.1 dB/RIU and 548.95 dB/RIU, respectively. And the average and linear detection resolution of the sensor are 1.3010-6 RIU （RIU：refractive index unit） and 1.8210-5 RIU, respectively. This sensor has a fast and cost-effective fabrication process which can be used in the cases of requiring portability and disposability.

Integrated thin film lithium niobate Fabry–Perot modulator[Invited]

Integrated traveling-wave lithium niobate modulators need relatively large device lengths to achieve low drive voltage. To increase modulation efficiency within a compact footprint, we report an integrated Fabry–Perot-type electro-optic thin film lithium niobate on insulator modulator comprising a phase modulation region sandwiched between two distributed Bragg reflectors. The device exhibits low optical loss and a high tuning efficiency of 15.7 pm/V. We also confirm the modulator's high-speed modulation performance by non-return-to-zero modulation with a data rate up to 56 Gbit/s.

Facile preparation of silver nanoparticles in bulk silicate glass by high-repetition-rate picosecond laser pulses

One-step precipitation of Ag nanoparticles in Ag+-doped silicate glasses was achieved through a focused picosecond laser with a high repetition rate. Absorption spectra and transmission electron microscopy(TEM) confirmed that metallic Ag nanoparticles were precipitated within glass samples in the laser-written domain. The surface plasmon absorbance fits well with the experimental absorption spectrum. The nonlinear absorption coefficient β is determined to be 2.47 × 10-14 m/W by fitting the open aperture Z-scan curve, which originated from the intraband transition in the s-p Ag band. The formation mechanism of Ag-glass nanocomposites is discussed as well.

High-Q lithium niobate microring resonators using lift-off metallic masks [Invited]

High-Q lithium niobate(LN) optical micro-resonators are an excellent platform for future applications in optical communications, nonlinear optics, and quantum optics. To date, high-Q factors are typically achieved in LN using either dielectric masks or femtosecond laser ablation, while the more standard and commonly available lift-off metallic masks are often believed to lead to rough sidewalls and lowered Q factors. Here, we show that LN microring resonators with strong light confinement and intrinsic Q factors over 1 million can be fabricated using optimized lift-off metallic masks and dry etching processes, corresponding to a waveguide propagation loss of ~0.3 d B=cm. The entire process is fully compatible with wafer-scale production and could be transferred to other photonic materials.