Heterogene integratie op chips

Nanofotonica

Invent - Imec and its associated laboratory at the Ghent University develop photonic components and systems-on-a-chip for use in communication and sensors. The technology used is standard CMOS on 200mm silicon-on-insulator (SOI).

The high-index contrast in SOI allows for nanophotonic designs with ultra-compact waveguides and cavities. For the active photonic functions, functional materials are integrated, such as bonded III-V membranes, liquid crystals, colloidal nanocrystals, metals, and biomolecules.

The resulting ultra-compact photonic ICs can be used in telecommunication, (bio)-sensing, and in biomedical applications. Also, the CMOS compatible processing favors leveraging the existing IC technology base for submicron mass-fabrication of photonics ICs.

Achieve - In 2008, imec has made significant technical advances in silicon photonics. New fabrication processes based on 193nm lithography now enable nanometer-scale uniformity of waveguide critical dimensions. And wavelength-selective filters and demultiplexers now have very low insertion loss and crosstalk. The grating couplers for interfacing with optical fibers have been improved to get a higher coupling efficiency. We also demonstrated various sensor circuits.