Nonlinear grating structures in indium antimonide waveguides.

Abstract

This dissertation describes various nonlinear grating coupling phenomena in InSb waveguides. InSb exhibits an opto-thermal, diffusive nonlinearity at 9.6μm. This nonlinearity strongly modifies the growth of a guided wave via the grating coupling of an incident, Gaussian signal. In particular, optical limiting and bistability in the coupled power were demonstrated for a detuned grating coupler. The limits on the detunings were also investigated. The experimental results showed qualitative agreement with a theory based upon a diffusive nonlinearity in the grating coupling process. Also demonstrated and theoretically explained was a new form of "butterfly" bistability in the output coupled signal from a nonlinear waveguide. In this situation, nonlinear interference effects in the substrate modified the proportion of power outcoupled into the cover and the substrate. The effects of a thermal nonlinearity on the response of a distributed feedback grating (DFB) were also studied. The DFB reflection response of an incident guided wave was modified either by varying the power of the incident guided wave or that of a second guided wave. Also, the effects of the DFB reflection were shown to enhance the bistable input grating coupling process by providing an additional feedback. This enhancement resulted in a smaller incident switching power required to obtain bistability in the input coupler.