Global Conference Recognizes Made-In- Canada Photonics Innovations

Global conference recognizes made-in- Canada photonics innovations anadian excellence in silicon photonics research Cwas globally recognized this year when three researchers from Canada’s National Design Network® (CNDN) received “Top-Scored Paper” honours at OFC 2017, the leading international conference on optical communications. Dr. Joyce Poon, Dr. Sorin Voinigescu (University of Joyce Poon, Sorin Voinigescu and their teams solved a significant problem in short-distance optical Toronto) and their teams, with Dr. Robert Mallard of CMC Microsystems, were honored in the Active communications with their development of a 3-D integrated transmitter using a CMOS driver. Their Devices category for their development of a 3D novel solution combines the advantages of high performance and low power consumption with low-cost, integrated silicon photonic electro-optic transmitter. established manufacturing processes. Also recognized in the category was Dr. David Plant (McGill University), for silicon photonic intensity transmit a lot of data using light, rather than The performance of their microsystem was modulators showing record-breaking modulation electricity, over shorter distances. outstanding, achieving the highest dynamic extinction speeds. Dr. Lukas Chrostowski (University of British ratio for this type of transmitter at more than 40 Columbia), was honored in the Passive Devices “The demands for bringing the amazing Gigabits per second. It was also the first silicon category for a new method of automatically tuning performance of fibre optics to short distances photonic electro-optic transmitter to use a CMOS and stabilizing high-order optical filters in silicon are escalating,” she says. “That’s where silicon driver to operate beyond 32 Gigabits per second. photonics. photonics comes in. It’s possible that by using the manufacturing infrastructure that the electronics Looking to the future, the University of Toronto Sometimes called “the on-ramps to the future,” industry has used for decades, we can mass- team aims to explore more advanced modulation photonics innovations use light to enable produce these photonic components at low costs.” formats that would put more information on the same advancements in power, speed and performance far bandwidth, increasing information-carrying capacity. beyond what’s possible with electronics. Their solution integrated a high-performance Poon’s group is also developing more efficient, low- electronic integrated circuit with very high-end power modulators. Fibre optics, the backbone of global data silicon photonics semiconductor technology communications, solved the problem of long-distance using a CMOS driver. The workhorse of the “While important in their own right, this year’s communications by converting electrical signals to microelectronics industry, CMOS offers the OFC honours also tell a great story about CNDN optical ones. Now Dr. Poon’s group has figured out a benefits of low cost and established manufacturing researchers and the resources that are made way to adapt that capability to the immensely greater processes. available to them,” Dr. Poon says. demands of short-distance communications, such as in data centres and high-performance computing, The University of Toronto team worked with “Our work is all related, and it paints an amazingly where transmitting vast volumes of data requires CMC Microsystems throughout the development strong picture of how CMC’s investment in silicon ever-greater amounts of power. process. In addition to providing software design photonics over the past several years, from training tools such as Cadence, COMSOL and ANSYS, to technologies, is making an impact today,” she The technology demonstrated in the collaboration CMC helped them with fabrication and integration says. “And that impact is a direct result of us having between University of Toronto and CMC solves of their microelectronic and silicon photonic chips. access to technologies and expertise at a reasonable some significant challenges in short-distance optical This collaboration carried out under the CMC cost. It means we can take risks and try out new ideas,” communications, offering high performance at low Solutions program provided a fruitful learning says Poon. power, with the potential for cost-effective, high- experience for the graduate students involved. volume manufacturability. Indeed, the other co-authors of the OFC paper, “These honours reflect the outstanding work that is Zheng Yong, Stefan Shopov, Jared Mikkelsen being done by Canada’s National Design Network “Today, all these short links, whether from your and Jason Mak, were all PhD students at the in putting light to work,” says Dan Gale, Vice- computer to the wall outlet or in a data centre, are University of Toronto. President and CTO of CMC Microsystems. “No one done with electrical cabling. And as data rates else in the world has this experience in successfully increase, so too does energy cost of transmitting the “Demonstrating the chip was exciting because we prototyping innovations in photonics, and particularly information,” says Poon, a Professor of Computer took a high-end CMOS chip and put it on top of the silicon photonics. It is the technology of the future, and Electrical Engineering who also holds a Canada silicon photonics to achieve excellent performance. and these awards show that Canada’s photonics Research Chair in Integrated Photonic Devices. It was a nice surprise that the CMOS technology innovators continue to lead the way.” cmc did even better than a more complicated, The challenge was to come up with the photonic expensive, non-CMOS technology,” Poon says. integrated circuits and microsystems to efficiently December 2017 © 2017 and Reg. TM – CMC Microsystems. All rights reserved. | www.cmc.ca.

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