Parameter optimization and structural design of polymer arrayed waveguide grating multiplexer

First some important parameters are optimized for the structural design of a polymer arrayed waveguide grating (AWG) multiplexer around the central wavelength of 1.55 mum with the wavelength spacing of 1.6 nm. These parameters include the thickness and width of the guide core, mode effective refractive indices and group refractive index, diffraction order, pitch of adjacent waveguides, length difference of adjacent arrayed waveguides, focal length of slab waveguides, free spectral range (FSR), the number of input/output (I/O) channels, and that of arrayed waveguides. Then the bent angles, radii and lengths of all the input/output channels and arrayed waveguides are determined. Finally. a schematic waveguide layout of this device is presented, which contains 2 slabs, 11 input channels, 11 output channels, and 91 arrayed waveguides. (C) 2002 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.