Design of polarisation-independent bidirectional 2 x 2 optical switch

Optical switching plays a vital role in all optical communication and network. Various optical switchings have been developed in recent years as a way to improve reliability problems and to build small size, robust integrated devices. A novel low crosstalk, high switching speed, compact in structure, efficient in performance, polarisation independent, and reversible 2 x 2 optical switching is proposed using a phase spatial light modulator (PSLM), a polarising beam-splitter (PBS), a mirror, a half-wave plate (HWP) and a quarter-wave plate (QWP). The optical switching should be helpful in the design of a large-scale switch matrix, and show considerable promise in the future of fibre optic networks.