C-band 67 GHz silicon photonic microring modulator for dispersion-uncompensated 100 Gbaud PAM-4

• Published in: Optics letters Vol. 47; no. 11; p. 2935
• Main Authors: Chan, David W U, Wu, Xiong, Zhang, Zunyue, Lu, Chao, Lau, Alan Pak Tao, Tsang, Hon Ki
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 01.06.2022
• ISSN: 1539-4794
• DOI: 10.1364/OL.460602

A very-high-bandwidth integrated silicon microring modulator (MRM) designed on a commercial silicon photonics (SiP) platform for C-band operation is presented. The MRM has a 3 dB electro-optic (EO) bandwidth of over 67 GHz and features a small footprint of 24 µm × 70 µm. Using the MRM, we demonstrate intensity modulation-direct detection (IM-DD) transmission with 4-level pulse amplitude modulation (PAM-4)  signaling of over 100 Gbaud. By utilizing the optical peaking effect and negative chirp in the MRM, we extend the transmission distance, which is limited by the fiber-dispersion-induced frequency fading. Using a standard single-mode fiber (SSMF) for transmission across distances of up to 2 km, we measured the data transmission of 100 Gbaud PAM-4 signals with a bit error rate (BER) under the general 7% hard-decision forward-error correction (HD-FEC) threshold. The MRM enables an extended transmission distance for 100 Gbaud signaling in the C-band without dispersion compensation.