Optimization of plasmonic-organic hybrid electro-optics

Chipscale integration of electronics and photonics is a logical next step in the evolution of information technology; however, given issues related to the footprint of photonic devices and circuits, bandwidth of current electro-optic (EO) modulators, energy efficiency of EO devices, and optical loss budget, electronic photonic integration represents a grand challenge requiring both improvement of electro-optic materials and implementation of novel device architectures. Progress in silicon photonics and plasmonics has brought chipscale integration closer to reality. This presentation focuses on the utilization of multiscale theoretical methods to significantly increase the electro-optic activity of organic π-electron materials. Such improvement is crucial to reducing EO device footprint, energy requirements, optical insertion loss, and improving operational bandwidth. Indeed, current improvement of in-device EO activity to values of several hundred picometers (pm) per volt (V) has permitted device voltage-length parameters to be improved to 40 V-μm, energy efficiency to approximately 1 femtojoule/bit, bandwidth to > 170 GHz, and optical insertion loss to <; 6 dB.