New Delhi, June 14 (India Science Wire): Researchers from the Centre for Nano Science and Engineering (CeNSE), Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, have developed an improved Silicon-based platform for economised and more efficient microchips.
Silicon (Si) is the foundation of today’s electronics and photonics industries. Si photonics has emerged as a promising CMOS (Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor) -compatible material platform for fabricating low-cost, scalable, integrated components for on-chip applications.
“Despite the tremendous advancement, there are some limitations of Si material, such as high Thermo-Optic Coefficient (TOC), large Two-Photon Absorption (TPA), and Free-Carrier Absorption (FCA) losses below 2.2 m wavelength, which impose fundamental limitations for its application in the telecom band. Hence, there is a quest for an alternative CMOS platform,” says Prof. Shankar K. Selvaraja, the lead researcher.
CMOS is a semiconductor technology that is used in most of today’s chips or microchips. The researchers have characterized the linear and nonlinear properties of the Si-Rich Silicon Nitride (SRSN) platform, capable of serving as an alternative platform to realize low-cost on-chip applications.
TPA and FCA losses are detrimental for many applications. Also, the chip must be highly stable with the change in environmental temperature to avoid appliance malfunction.
“The SRSN material developed by the team exhibits high thermal stability compared with Si, with no demonstrated TPA and FCA losses at the telecom band. The TOC of the SRSN material was found to be much lower than that of Si. It can be an ideal platform for operating a multitude of applications in the telecom band,” Prof Selvaraja explains.
The size of the Silicon photonics market is estimated to be $1,489.43 million in 2023 and is expected to reach $4,541.75 million by 2028.
“Our SRSN material has the potential to provide an efficient alternative platform to realize integrated photonic devices for a multitude of applications, including on-chip signal processing, quantum technologies, and integrated nonlinear frequency conversion. The findings will pave the way for realizing SRSN-based on-chip applications,” the researchers believe. The team comprised Dr Partha Mondal, Venkatachalam P., Radhakant Singh, Sneha Shelwade, Gali Sushma, and Prof. Shankar K. Selvaraja. The study has been published in the journal, Optica.
