Abstract

The advantage of building integrated optical devices on silicon substrate is to utilize the superb electronics properties of silicon. Of particular importance is the possibility of constructing various types of photodetectors which are directly coupled to the optical circuitry monolithically, because photodetectors are required in nearly every integrated optics applications. Waveguide coupled photodetectors on silicon substrate have been reported before both as photodiode array¹ and as CCD array.² In this paper, we report the experimental result of a high quantum efficiency waveguide coupled photodetector using controlled chemical etch profile for reproduceable efficient waveguide/detector coupling. In addition, the optical waveguide used is the widely accepted 7059 glass/SiO₂/Si structure rather than the KPR photoresist^1,2. Furthermore, we have shown that the waveguide/detector transition structure employed is compatible to the construction of a very high density (4 micron periode) detector array, which is often needed for certain applications such as the integrated optical spectrum analyzer.^3,4

© 1980 Optical Society of America