Erbium doped materials are of great interest in thin film integrated optoelectronic technology, due to their Er3+ intra-4f emission at 1.54 μm, a standard telecommunication wavelength. Er-doped dielectric thin films can be used to fabricate planar optical amplifiers or lasers that can be integrated with other devices on the same chip. Semiconductors, such as silicon, can also be doped with erbium. In this case the Er may be excited through optically or electrically generated charge carriers. Er-doped Si light-emitting diodes may find applications in Si-based optoelectronic circuits. In this article, the synthesis, characterization, and application of several different Er-doped thin film photonic materials is described. It focuses on oxide glasses (pure SiO2, phosphosilicate, borosilicate, and soda-lime glasses), ceramic thin films (Al2O3, Y2O3, LiNbO3), and amorphous and crystalline silicon, all doped with Er by ion implantation. MeV ion implantation is a technique that is ideally suited to dope these materials with Er as the ion range corresponds to the typical micron dimensions of these optical materials. The role of implantation defects, the effect of annealing, concentration dependent effects, and optical activation are discussed and compared for the various materials.

Erbium implanted thin film photonic materials

Recent developments in rare-earth doped materials for optoelectronics

Organic dye-doped polymers have been widely investigated as gain media in solid-state dye lasers. Dye molecules which have large absorption and induced emission cross sections due to allowed π-π transitions are ideal active dopants for the generation and amplification of intense light pulses. However, continuous wave operation is not feasible with organic dyes because of the triplet losses. On the other hand, lanthanide ions that have long metastable state lifetimes are widely used in silica glass-based fiber amplifiers and for both continuous and pulsed lasers. It has been more than 30 years since the first lanthanide lasers were reported.1-3 During this period a wide variety of lanthanide lasers and amplifiers have been investigated, and extensive progress has been made by many researchers. Many reviews have been written concentrating primarily on the physical and chemical properties of lanthanides in many matrices for laser action.4-8 Recently, several books have focused on lanthanide-doped fiber amplifiers for optical communications.9-11 The success of lanthanide-doped fiber amplifiers has inspired thousands of publications and continues to motivate research on the many diverse components that are required in these systems. Optical links are now used primarily in applications such as telecommunications with single-mode silica optical fibers, which have the ability to provide high-bandwidth and long-distance communications. However, as the demand for bandwidth increases in the office and home, it has become increasingly important to develop very low cost optical links that can be readily installed by users. Plastic optical fibers (POF) have received increasing attention because of their clear technical advantages over glass fibers, such as flexibility and a large core diameter, which enables efficient connection and coupling resulting in a low-cost system for a local area network. Recently a low-loss (100 db/km), highbandwidth 5.12 GHz for 100 m transmission graded index plastic optical fiber (GI-POF) has been developed.12 Also, an all fluorinated POF, whose low loss region is extended to the visible and near-infrared, has been successfully prepared.13 Plastic optical fiber amplifiers (POFA) that generate signal light in the visible and near-infrared are potentially important because of their adaptability for POF-based short span optical local distribution networks. This review describes recent progress on plastic optical fiber lasers and amplifiers with lanthanides. We focus especially on the design and selection of plastic optical fiber and chelate materials.

Plastic optical fiber lasers and amplifiers containing lanthanide complexes.

Erbium-doped fiber devices have been extraordinarily successful due to their broad optical gain around 1.5–1.6 μm. Er-doped fiber amplifiers enable efficient, stable amplification of high-speed, wavelength-division-multiplexed signals, thus continue to dominate as part of the backbone of longhaul telecommunications networks. At the same time, Er-doped fiber lasers see many applications in telecommunications as well as in biomedical and sensing environments. Over the last 20 years significant efforts have been made to bring these advantages to the chip level. Device integration decreases the overall size and cost and potentially allows for the combination of many functions on a single tiny chip. Besides technological issues connected to the shorter device lengths and correspondingly higher Er concentrations required for high gain, the choice of appropriate host material as well as many design issues come into play in such devices. In this contribution the important developments in the field of Er-doped integrated waveguide amplifiers and lasers are reviewed and current and future potential applications are explored. The vision of integrating such Er-doped gain devices with other, passive materials platforms, such as silicon photonics, is discussed.

Erbium-doped integrated waveguide amplifiers and lasers

Optical waveguide amplifiers based on polymer materials offer a low-cost alternative for inorganic waveguide amplifiers. Due to the fact that their refractive index is similar to that of standard optical fibers, they can be easily coupled to existing fibers with low coupling losses. Doping the polymer with rare-earth ions that yield optical gain is not straightforward, as the rare-earth salts are poorly soluble in the polymer matrix. This review article focuses on two different approaches to dope a polymer waveguide with rare-earth ions. The first approach is based on organic cage-like complexes that encapsulate the rare-earth ion and are designed to provide coordination sites to bind the rare-earth ion and to shield it from the surrounding matrix. These complexes also offer the possibility of attaching a highly absorbing antenna group, which increases the pump efficiency significantly. The second approach to fabricate rare-earth doped polymer waveguides is obtained by combining the excellent properties of SiO2 as a host for rare-earth ions with the easy processing of polymers. This is done by doping polymers with Er-doped silica colloidal spheres.

Rare-earth doped polymers for planar optical amplifiers

A 4 cm long Er‐doped Al2O3 spiral waveguide amplifier was fabricated on a Si substrate, and integrated with wavelength division multiplexers within a total area of 15 mm2. When pumped with 9 mW 1.48 μm light from a laser diode, the amplifier shows 2.3 dB net optical gain at 1.53 μm. The gain threshold was 3 mW. The amplifier was doped with Er by ion implantation to a concentration of 2.7×1020 cm−3. The data agree well with calculations based on a model which includes the effects of cooperative upconversion and excited state absorption. For an optimized amplifier, net optical gain of 20 dB is predicted.

/pdf/net-optical-gain-at-1-53-mu-m-in-er-doped-al2o3-waveguides-3jn4w9dkwr.pdf

Net optical gain at 1.53 mu m in Er-doped Al2O3 waveguides on silicon

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Net optical gain at 1.53 mu m in Er-doped Al2O3 waveguides on silicon