September 15, 2002 / Vol. 27, No.

18 / OPTICS LETTERS 1601

High-efficiency coupling structure for a single-line-defect

photonic-crystal waveguide
Dennis W. Prather, Janusz Murakowski, Shouyuan Shi, Sriram Venkataraman, Ahmed Sharkawy,
Caihua Chen, and David Pustai
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Delaware, Newark, Delaware 19716

Received April 24, 2002

We present the design and fabrication of a planar structure for coupling light from a multimode feed wave-
guide into a single-line-defect photonic-crystal waveguide. Finite-difference time-domain calculations predict
a coupling efficiency of greater than 90%, and preliminary experimental results indicate successful coupling
through a single-line-defect photonic-crystal waveguide. Device design, fabrication, and characterization are
presented. © 2002 Optical Society of America
OCIS codes: 230.7390, 230.3120, 230.7390, 130.1750, 130.3120.

During the past decade, photonic crystals (also known into multimode dielectric waveguides. However, once
as photonic-bandgap or PBG materials) have risen the light is in the feed waveguide, it is still diff icult
from a relatively obscure science to a prominent to couple eff iciently into a photonic-crystal channel.
field of research. In large part, this is due to their Thus, the dielectric mirror should be designed accord-
unique ability to control, or redirect, the propagation ing to the type of incident wave, such as a plane wave,
of light.1,2 In this manner, photonic crystals have a particular waveguide mode, or a Gaussian beam.
been used to improve the overall performance of many In our design we assume that the input waveguide
optoelectronic devices.3 However, a major obstacle to is wide enough that when it is excited by a plane
the widespread use of planar photonic-crystal devices wave, the wave propagating inside the waveguide can
is the inability to couple light into them efficiently. be considered a plane wave instead of a multimode
The primary reason for this diff iculty lies in the mode wave. The ref lection mirror function transforms a
mismatch between an incident field and that of a waveguide plane wave into a narrow beam, whose
single-channel waveguide in a photonic-crystal lattice. size is similar to that of a photonic-crystal waveguide,
As a result, when direct coupling is attempted, the such that the J-coupler can achieve high coupling
small mode overlap results in low coupling eff iciency. efficiency.8 Accordingly, in this Letter we present
Currently, most of the coupling methods that have the general design of the structure and then apply it
been experimentally verified and reported in the lit-
erature show coupling losses of the order of 20– 30 dB
(Refs. 4 and 5); in other words, only 1% of the optical
power ends up in the photonic-crystal channel. Such
loss is unacceptable if photonic-crystal devices are to
be of practical use in next-generation optoelectronic
systems.
To address this problem, we have developed a simple,
yet effective, way to couple light into photonic-crystal
waveguides. This is achieved by design of a ref lec-
tive structure that focuses light from a dielectric feed
waveguide to a photonic-crystal channel, as shown in
Fig. 1. We refer to this device as the J-coupler, which
is a planar version of an offset parabolic mirror, fa-
miliar from the study of large-scale geometrical optics
as well as microwave dish antennas. Computer simu-
lations using a two-dimensional implementation of
the finite-difference time-domain method6 conf irm
the unique advantages of this approach, including
efficiencies greater than 90%. Also, the J-coupler is
broadband since resonant structures are not used. In
the remainder of this Letter we present the design
of the J-coupler with a simple ray-tracing technique.
We then present the fabrication of this device, along
with preliminary experimental results.
A key feature of the J-coupler is that it is a planar
structure and, consequently, is easily fabricated with
standard microelectronic techniques. Additionally,
one can use more-conventional and proven methods, Fig. 1. Simulation of J-coupler performance with the
such as end-f ire, prism, or grating coupling,7 to couple finite-difference time-domain method.
0146-9592/02/181601-03$15.00/0 © 2002 Optical Society of America
1602 OPTICS LETTERS / Vol. 27, No. 18 / September 15, 2002
to couple a plane wave into a single-defect photonic-
crystal channel.
The fundamental condition for the operation of the
dielectric mirror surface is that all possible optical
paths (i.e., those emanating from the feed waveguide)
travel the same distance to the desired focal point, F .
By satisfying this condition, we can ensure that the
phase front of the incident beam constructively inter-
feres at the focal point. If we conveniently choose the
focal point to coincide with the origin, and the incident
wave to be a plane wave propagating in the negative
Y direction, we have
q jection, with the radius, a, and the center at the
y0 2 y 1 x2 1 y 2 苷 constant ,
where x and y are the coordinates of the mirror surface
and y0 is the initial position of the wave front of the
incident plane wave, as shown in Fig. 2. After some
algebra, we arrive at
x2 a ,
y苷 2 (1)
2a 2
where a is a constant. Equation (1) describes a
parabola with a focus at the origin and the directrix
at y 苷2a.
Although Eq. (1) satisf ies the criterion of construc-
tive interference at the focal point, for maximum
efficiency the resultant beam needs to propagate in
the same direction as the photonic-crystal channel, or,
more precisely, the resultant Poynting vector at the
focal point has to be parallel to the photonic-crystal
channel. This requirement can be satisf ied for a
wide range of channel directions. Below, we discuss
a special case in which the photonic-crystal channel
is oriented at a right angle with respect to the feed
waveguide.
As presented in Fig. 2, an electromagnetic wave
propagating downward, or in the Y direction, is
def lected by a dielectric mirror in the form of a
section of parabola described by Eq. (1). The goal
is to have the energy of the wave at the focal point
propagate in only the horizontal direction. To achieve
this, we must ensure that the contributions to the
Y components from all rays ref lected by the mirror
cancel. It can be shown that the Y component of a
vector originally pointing in the negative Y direction
and ref lected by a mirror described by a function
f 共x兲 is given by 兵1 2 关 f 0 共x兲兴2 兾兵1 1 关 f 0 共x兲兴2 其. In our
case, the function f 共x兲 is given by Eq. (1) and yields
关1 2 共x兾a兲2 兴兾关1 1 共x兾a兲2 兴 as the Y component of the
beam ref lected at point 共x, y 苷 x2 兾2a 2 a兾2兲 of the
mirror. Therefore, the total contribution to the Y
component is given by the integral
Z A2 1 2 共x兾a兲2
w共x兲dx ,
A1 1 1 共x兾a兲
2
where A1 and A2 are the X coordinates of the begin-
ning and end points of the parabolic mirror, respec-
tively, and w共x兲 is a weight function that corresponds to
the intensity distribution of the incoming wave. Thus,
for the wave to propagate horizontally, or purely in the
X direction, integral (2) must vanish. To calculate in-
tegral (2), it is necessary to first determine the weight
function w共x兲. If the incident wave is a plane wave,
w共x兲 is constant and can be factored out. In this case,
integral (2) can be calculated analytically, and the con-
dition of propagation of the focused wave purely in the
X direction takes the form of an equation constraining
the parabolic mirror parameters:
A1 2 A2 苷 2a关arctan共A1 兾a兲 2 arctan共A2 兾a兲兴 . (3)
Geometrically, this means that the orthogonal pro-
jection of the mirror on the directrix has to be
twice the length of an arc def ined by this pro-
focal point of the parabola. In more-realistic situ-
ations in which a feed waveguide of a finite width
is used, the weight function w共x兲 cannot be ig-
nored. These cases have to be considered sepa-
rately and in general require numerical integration of
integral (2). Using the approach presented above, we
designed a J-coupler and evaluated its performance.
We simulated the coupling from the dielectric to the
photonic-crystal waveguide with a two-dimensional
implementation of the f inite-difference time domain
method, in which we applied a perfectly matched
layer9 absorbing boundary condition. The fundamen-
tal mode was excited at the input of the dielectric feed
waveguide. Then the wave propagated through the
dielectric waveguide onto the J-coupler and f inally
was ref lected into the photonic-crystal channel. The
resulting coupling efficiency was 91%, where the cou-
pling efficiency is evaluated as the ratio between the
average power f low inside the wide input waveguide
and the average power f low inside the narrow out-
put waveguide. To investigate the device operation
further, we fabricated a sample and experimentally
characterized its performance.
Our experimental implementation of the J-coupler
system consists of three main parts: a planar di-
electric waveguide (10 mm wide), a planar parabolic
mirror, and a photonic-crystal structure, all existing
in the 0.45-mm device layer of a silicon-on-insulator
wafer. The photonic crystal consists of air holes
in silicon, which has an index of refraction of
nPhC 苷 3.47, resting on silicon dioxide, with refractive
(2)
Fig. 2. Illustration of the geometry of the J-coupler used
for analysis and design.
 September 15, 2002 / Vol. 27, No. 18 / OPTICS LETTERS
Fig. 3. Scanning-electron microscope picture of the fabri-
cated J-coupler.
Fig. 4. Images of the experimental results of the J-coupler
with a near-IR camera.
index n ⬃ 1.5. The lattice is triangular, with a
lattice constant a 苷 0.45 mm and hole diameter
2r 苷 0.375 mm. Such a photonic-crystal structure
has a bandgap for TE-like modes from l 苷 1.07 mm to
l 苷 1.55 mm. The single-channel defect for the pho-
tonic-crystal waveguide had a width wPhC 苷 0.42 mm.
The mirror was designed to have a focal length
approximately equal to the width W of the dielectric
waveguide, which was 10 mm.
In the fabrication process, we used direct-write elec-
tron-beam lithography to pattern the feed waveguides,
J-coupler, and photonic-crystal channels. Then the
pattern, developed in polymethyl methacrylate, was
transferred into the silicon layer by a dry etching
process with a reactive-ion etching system, as shown
in Fig. 3. To achieve vertical sidewalls of the pat-
terned holes in the 0.45-mm layer of silicon, we used
a multistep process in which we cycled passivation
film deposition for sidewall protection, high-energy
smash, and low-energy etch to achieve the desired
depth. Details of the fabrication process are currently
being prepared for publication. We then optically
characterized the device.
To test the operation of the J-coupler experimen-
tally, we designed and built a symmetric imaging
system to couple light into an input J-coupler, through
a 70-mm-long and 0.42-mm-wide photonic-crystal
single-defect waveguide, and to an output J-coupler,
as shown in Fig. 4. In this case, the input J-coupler
converts the wave propagating in the feed waveguide
to a converging wave, which is incident on the input
side of the photonic-crystal waveguide, while the
output J-coupler reciprocally converts the diverging
wave coming from the output of the photonic-crystal
waveguide into a wave that is launched into the output
feed waveguide.
1603
The experimental setup used to characterize the
J-coupler consisted of a collimated 1.3-mm laser diode
incident on a 103 magnif ication objective that was
end-fire coupled into the feed waveguide. We imaged
the top surface of the J-coupler system for end-fire
coupling alignment to observe any radiation modes
within the photonic-crystal waveguide and to observe
the outcoupled f ield. The imaging system consisted
of a second microscope objective (with 403 magnifica-
tion) and an IR camera that was connected to a frame
grabber in a personal computer.
In an end-fire coupling system, the incident wave is
directly focused onto the edge of the feed waveguide.
In our case, we placed the waveguide at the focal spot of
the microscope objective to match the incident Gauss-
ian beam prof ile with the fundamental mode of the
waveguide. By carefully aligning the laser with the
input face of the waveguide, using piezoelectric actua-
tors, we were able to observe light propagating through
the single-channel PBG waveguide and on the output
face of the dielectric waveguide, as shown in Fig. 4.
Although these initial results validate the f inding that
the J-coupler successfully couples light into and out of
the PBG waveguide, precise efficiency measurements
have yet to be performed. In our future work, we in-
tend to accurately quantify the throughput efficiency
of the entire system, in addition to investigating iso-
lated J-coupler performance.
We have designed, fabricated, and demonstrated
an integrated planar coupling structure for photonic-
bandgap devices, which we refer to as the J-coupler.
We have presented computational models that predict
a J-coupler coupling efficiency of 91%, in addition to
preliminary experimental results of its performance.
This work was supported, in part, by OptronX,
Inc., through the Delaware Research Partnership for
industrial collaboration. In particular, the authors
acknowledge the significant contributions of Shrenik
Deliwala and the OASIS team. D. W. Prather’s e-mail
address is dprather@ee.udel.edu.
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