Harvard Researchers Build the First Integrated Laser on a Lithium Niobate Chip

Harvard University's school of engineering has an announcement. "For all the recent advances in integrated lithium niobate photonic circuits — from frequency combs to frequency converters and modulators — one big component has remained frustratingly difficult to integrate: lasers..." Long haul telecommunication networks, data center optical interconnects, and microwave photonic systems all rely on lasers to generate an optical carrier used in data transmission. In most cases, lasers are stand-alone devices, external to the modulators, making the whole system more expensive and less stable and scalable.

Now, researchers from the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) in collaboration with industry partners at Freedom Photonics and HyperLight Corporation, have developed the first fully integrated high-power laser on a lithium niobate chip, paving the way for high-powered telecommunication systems, fully integrated spectrometers, optical remote sensing, and efficient frequency conversion for quantum networks, among other applications....

"Integrating high-performance plug-and-play lasers would significantly reduce the cost, complexity, and power consumption of future communication systems," said Amirhassan Shams-Ansari, a graduate student at SEAS and first author of the study. "It's a building block that can be integrated into larger optical systems for a range of applications, in sensing, lidar, and data telecommunications." By combining thin-film lithium niobate devices with high-power lasers using an industry-friendly process, this research represents a key step towards large-scale, low-cost, and high-performance transmitter arrays and optical networks.
Thanks to Slashdot reader Hari Pota for sharing the story (via Semicounductor Digest)

Pornography

[backslashdot]

Reading their journal publication. It says their integration approach "relies on butt coupling between DFB and TFLN waveguides."

There's pictures of it in Figure 1 if you're interested.

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[algaeman]

Seems more like a Beavis & Butthead "heh, heh, you said butt coupling" thing than porn.

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[Aighearach]

Well that is a huge disappointment, I hope they figure out which end of the shark to stick the laser to next time.

I wondered for a sec. . .

[Dictator For Life]

For all the recent advances in integrated lithium niobate photonic circuits — from frequency combs to frequency converters and modulators . . . I was waiting for something to do with the deflector dish.

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[Fly Swatter]

They did mention quantum networking - which is close enough to qualify for the Sci-Fi angle.

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[NicknameUnavailable]

Honestly, this is the big thing lacking for photonic chips, so picture up to THz clock frequency chips wherein multiple chips can occupy the same physical space. It's still a lot of engineering to get there, but the hangup has been the fundamental aspect of making light efficiently on a chip.