Ultra-low-power nonvolatile integrated photonic switches and modulators based on nanogap-enhanced phase-change waveguides

We propose a nanogap-enhanced phase-change waveguide with silicon PIN heaters. Thanks to the enhanced light-matter interaction in the nanogap, the proposed structure exhibits strong attenuation (Δα = ∼35 dB/µm) and optical phase (Δn eff  = ∼1.2) modulation at λ = 1550 nm when achieving complete phase transitions. We further investigate two active optical devices based on the proposed waveguide, including an electro-absorption modulator and a 1 × 2 directional-coupler optical switch. Finite-difference time-domain simulation of the proposed modulator shows a high extinction ratio of ∼17 dB at 1550 nm with an active segment of volume only ∼0.004λ3. By exploiting a directional coupler design, we present a 1 × 2 optical switch with an insertion loss of < 4 dB and a compact coupling length of ∼ 15 µm while maintaining small crosstalk less than -7.2 dB over an optical bandwidth of 50 nm. Thermal analysis shows that a 10 V pulse of 30 ns (1×1 modulator) and 55 ns (1×2 switch) in duration is required to raise the GST temperature of the phase-change waveguide above the melting temperature to induce the amorphization; however, the complete crystallization occurs by applying a 5 V pulse of 180 ns (1×1 modulator) and a 6 V pulse of 200 ns (1×2 switch), respectively.