A Photonic Switch Based on a Hybrid Combination of Metallic Nanoholes and Phase-change Vanadium Dioxide

• Published in: Scientific reports Vol. 8; no. 1; pp. 11106 - 9
• Main Authors: Sun, Miao, Taha, Mohammad, Walia, Sumeet, Bhaskaran, Madhu, Sriram, Sharath, Shieh, William, Unnithan, Ranjith Rajasekharan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 23.07.2018; Nature Publishing Group
• Subjects: 142/126; 639/166/987; 639/301/1019; 639/624/399; 639/925/927/1021; Aluminum; Humanities and Social Sciences; multidisciplinary; Network switching; Phase transitions; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Thin films; Vanadium
• ISSN: 2045-2322; 2045-2322
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-29476-6

A photonic switch is an integral part of optical telecommunication systems. A plasmonic bandpass filter integrated with materials exhibiting phase transition can be used as a thermally reconfigurable optical switch. This paper presents the design and demonstration of a broadband photonic switch based on an aluminium nanohole array on quartz utilising the semiconductor-to-metal phase transition of vanadium dioxide. The fabricated switch shows an operating range over 650 nm around the optical communication C, L, and U band with maximum 20%, 23% and 26% transmission difference in switching in the C band, L band, and U band, respectively. The extinction ratio is around 5 dB in the entire operation range. This architecture is a precursor for developing micron-size photonic switches and ultra-compact modulators for thin film photonics.