Laser Beam Steering Via the Pockels Effect

Nonlinear optical polymer (NLOP) materials offer important advantages over ferroelectric (LiNbO3) and semiconductor (GaAs) materials for the fabrication of very high speed elector-optic devices, including modulators, switches, and multiplexers. The basic electronic interaction in NLOP yields high elector-optic coeffiecients with low dielectric constant resulting in potential device operation at speeds exceeding 100 GHz. For this effort Foster-Miller proposes to develop a unique integrated optic structure in NLOP materials which is capable of near instantaneous steering of an input laser beam. The device consists of a channel waveguide/electrode array, which will be computer modeled in Phase I. Also during Phase I, channel waveguide structures will be developed in NLOP material and completely characterized for the beam steering application. During Phase II a complete breadboard integrated optic chip will be fabricated in NLOP and completely characterized for microwave operation. The team of scientists from Foster-Miller and the University of Lowell assembled for this project are uniquely qualified for this effort with many years of experience in NLOP preparation, NLOP optical and electrical measurements, characterization of very high speed integrated optic devices.