Enhanced Transmission in a Fiber-Coupled Au Stripe Waveguide System

We experimentally demonstrated the enhanced transmission in a fiber-coupled Au stripe waveguide system using a linearly tapered (LT) structure at a telecommunication wavelength of 1.55 ¿m. The LT structure consists of two 100- ¿m-long tapered regions connecting various widths of input and output waveguides with a waist region. The lowest insertion loss of the 1-cm-long LT-Au stripe waveguide is ~ 4.3 dB, when it has 6-¿m -wide input and output waveguides and a 4- ¿m-wide waist waveguide. The insertion loss is reduced by ~ 2 dB compared to the 4-¿m-wide and 1-cm-long straight Au stripe waveguide, which is achieved by decreasing the coupling loss. The losses of the LT region, which has a tapered angle of less than 0.3° between the input-output waveguides and the waist waveguide, are smaller than 0.4 dB. We showed that the insertion loss of the Au stripe waveguide can be reduced by introducing the LT structure, which can also provide efficient mode conversion.