4H-SiC microring resonators for nonlinear integrated photonics

We demonstrate enhanced four-wave mixing (FWM) in high-quality factor, high-confinement 4H-SiC microring resonators via continuous-wave FWM. With the large power buildup effect of the microring resonator, -21.7  dBFWM conversion efficiency is achieved with 79 mW pump power. Thanks to the strong light confinement in SiC-on-insulator (SiCOI) waveguides with submicrometer cross-sectional dimensions, a high nonlinear parameter wγ of 7.4±0.9  W -1  m -1 is obtained, from which the nonlinear refractive index (n 2 ) of 4H-SiC is estimated to be (6.0±0.6)×10 -19   m 2 /W at the telecom wavelengths. Besides, we are able to engineer the dispersion of a SiCOI waveguide to achieve 3 dB FWM conversion bandwidth of more than 130 nm. This work represents a step toward enabling all-optical signal processing functionalities using highly nonlinear SiCOI waveguides.