An optical backplane demonstrator system based on FET-SEED smart pixel arrays and diffractive lenslet arrays

We have demonstrated a representative portion of an optical backplane using FET-SEED smart pixels and free-space optics to interconnect printed circuit boards (PCB's) in a two board, unidirectional link configuration. 4/spl times/4 arrays of FET-SEED transceivers were designed, fabricated, and packaged all the PCB level, The optical interconnection was constructed using diffractive microoptics, and custom optomechanics. The system was operated in two modes, one showing high data throughput, 100 MBit/sec, and the other demonstrating large connection densities, 2222 channel/cm/sup 2/.<
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