Efficient MIR crosstalk reduction based on silicon-on-calcium fluoride platform with Ge/Si strip arrays

Reduction of the crosstalk (CT) between contiguous photonic components is still a big challenge in fabricating high packing density photonic integrated circuits (PICs). Few techniques to accomplish that goal have been offered in recent years but all in the near-IR region. In this paper, we report a design for realizing a highly efficient CT reduction in the MIR regime, for the first time to the best of our knowledge. The reported structure is based on the silicon-on-calcium-fluoride (SOCF) platform with uniform Ge/Si strip arrays. Using Ge strips shows better CT reduction and longer coupling length (L(c)) than the conventional Si based devices over a wide bandwidth in the MIR region. The effect of adding a different number of Ge and Si strips with different dimensions between two adjacent Si waveguides on the L(c) and hence on the CT is analyzed using both full vectorial finite element method and 3D finite difference time domain method. An increase in the L(c) by 4 orders of magnitude and 6.5 times are obtained using Ge and Si strips, respectively, compared to strips-free Si waveguides. Consequently, crosstalk suppression of − 35 dB and − 10 dB for the Ge and Si strips, respectively, is shown. The proposed structure is beneficial for high packing density nanophotonic devices in the MIR regime, such as switches, modulators, splitters, and wavelength division (de)multiplexers, which are important for MIR communication integrated circuits, spectrometers, and sensors.