Abstract

Slot waveguides are promising new nanostructures for confining light in low-index materials[1,2]. The most straightforward way to make vertical slot waveguides is to use the Silicon-On-Insulator (SOI) platform, which provides strong light confinement in vertical direction. The SOI platform can also used to fabricate microelectronic devices, so SOI photonic components can be monolithically integrated with electronic chips. Highly-nonlinear slot waveguide with polymer filling has already been demonstrated by Koos et al.[3]. Because of its excellent conformity properties, Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) could be a very suitable method to fill vertical slot waveguides with inorganic materials. Intel has the ALD technology already in production in its new high-k silicon technology, so it would be a natural choice for enabling the integration of photonic components on the same chips.

© 2009 IEEE