High Speed E-O Polymer Photonic Devices by Nickel Template Replication with Transferred Traveling Wave Electrode

In this program, Omega Optics and the University of Texas at Austin propose to develop a cost effective UV imprinting technology using high quality metallic mold by directly electroplating nickel over photoresist patterns on transparent quartz substrate. Unlike any existing nano-imprinting technology which requires ion etching to transfer patterns into substrate, we can directly replicate template patterns into the bottom cladding through a low pressure UV imprinting process operated at room temperature. Additionally, we invent a new concept of molding-and-wire-transferring for the traveling wave electrodes. Instead of electroplating amorphous metal electrode, we transfer bulky gold wires with much better conductivity to the predefined position formed by metallic molding as well. Therefore it can achieve more than 60GHz bandwidth due to the low resistance traveling wave electrode. Given advantages of the high quality metallic template and the energy efficient imprinting fabrication, this project is expected to reduce fabrication cost for polymer photonic devices with improved performances. In the phase I program, we anticipate to demonstrating the feasibility of using nickel template based UV imprinting technology for the fabrication of polymer photonic devices. These devices are expected to show lower optical insertion loss and higher bandwidth compared with conventional photolithography and ion etched devices.