February 9, 2006, Suffolk, United Kingdom--The Department of Trade and Industry in the UK has awarded funding to a collaborative project to develop advanced InP-based photonic materials and devices as part of its Technology Programme. The organisations involved are Centre for Integrated Photonics (CIP), Bookham, Epichem, Loughborough Surface Analysis (LSA), the University of Sheffield and the University of Surrey (UniS).
The £1.7m ($3m), 2.5 year project called ETOE (Extended Temperature Optoelectronics) has two main thrusts. The first is the development of active devices containing aluminium. This will enable the high temperature operation of a range of advanced devices including fixed frequency and widely tuneable lasers, semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs), superluminescent diodes (SLDs) and avalanche photo diodes (APDs). The second is the development of improved processes for the MOVPE growth of semi-insulating current blocking layers using ruthenium doping to enable higher speed modulation of devices.
Results from the project are expected to lead to uncooled operation of high speed, high power lasers and SOAs which will enable drastic reductions in power consumption and allow closer stacking of optical interfaces.
The project partners' roles cover all aspects necessary to develop new MOVPE processes from precursor technologies (Epichem), layer growth (Bookham and CIP), structural design and modelling (Bookham, CIP, Sheffield and Surrey) to device fabrication (Bookham and CIP) with comprehensive characterisation at all stages to assess progress (LSA and Sheffield and Surrey). The complementary skills assembled for the project team ensure a high level of success in this ambitious area.
Ian Lealman of CIP, project manager for ETOE said "This project brings together a number of key players in the optoelectronics industry and academia to work collaboratively on fundamental technology solutions. This will enable the development of processes and materials that will help drive increases in speed, temperature performance and tunability."