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US 2016/0103283 A1Published application
Active alignment of optical fiber to chip using liquid crystals
AssigneeMicron Technology, Inc.
InventorsRoy Meade, Gurtej Sandhu
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Devices and systems to perform optical alignment by using one or more liquid crystal layers to actively steer a light beam from an optical fiber to an optical waveguide integrated on a chip. An on-chip feedback mechanism can steer the beam between the fiber and a grating based waveguide to minimize the insertion loss of the system.
Claims26
1-19. (canceled)
A method of manufacturing a photonic chip assembly, the method comprising:
- providing a chip having an optical waveguide integrated thereon;
- providing an optical fiber configured to provide a light beam therefrom;
- disposing a switchable beam steering device comprising a liquid crystal polarization grating between the optical fiber and the optical waveguide such that the switchable beam steering device is configured to receive the light beam from the optical fiber and to steer the light beam into the optical waveguide.
A method of aligning an optical fiber with an optical waveguide integrated on a chip, the method comprising:
- providing the chip having the optical waveguide integrated thereon and a switchable beam steering device coupled to one side of the optical waveguide, the switchable beam steering device comprising a liquid crystal polarization grating;
- disposing an optical fiber such that light from the optical fiber couples to the switchable beam steering device;
- and
- applying a voltage to the liquid crystal polarization grating to align light from the optical fiber into the waveguide.
1 more element
A method of aligning an optical fiber with an optical waveguide, the method comprising:
- disposing a beam steering device comprising a liquid crystal polarization grating between the output of the optical fiber and an input surface of the optical waveguide;
- applying an electric field to the beam steering device to actively steer an optical signal from the optical fiber to the optical waveguide.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.