EAGER: Novel Graphene Modulators

EAGER：新型石墨烯调制器

• 批准号: 1650776
• 负责人: Nadir Dagli
• 金额: $ 15万
• 依托单位: University of California-Santa Barbara
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2016
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2016-09-01 至 2019-02-28
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1650776&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: EAGER; Novel; Graphene; Modulators

Title: Study of Optical Modulators Based on Novel Material GrapheneAbstractNontechnical: With the advent of new applications such as social media, online medical records, cloud computing there is an astronomical increase in the data that is transmitted over the Internet and within the data centers. The only viable technology to transmit such vast amounts of information on demand is the fiber optics technology. This relies on transmitting optical radiation through optical fiber. However information is almost always available in electrical form. Transmitting electrical information over the optical fiber requires optical modulators. Optical modulator imposes electrical information on the optical radiation which transports electrical information over the optical fiber. Optical modulators are needed in large quantities and are desired to be very compact, low power consuming and low cost. Furthermore their technology should allow integration with other devices to form high functionality microchips. This proposal investigates the possibility of such modulators in a novel material called graphene. Graphene is an arrangement of mono layer thick carbon atoms. Therefore the proposed effort has the potential to benefit the society and make a significant contribution to quality of life through lower cost, higher performance data transmission using fiber optics.Technical: This proposal introduces a high risk and high reward approach for optical modulators. This is based on unique electro-optic properties of graphene. Commonly used theoretical formulas that describe conductivity of graphene suggest huge changes in real and imaginary parts of graphene dielectric constant when Fermi level in graphene is changed. This suggests very compact and efficient optical modulation. In particular using two graphene sheets separated by a thin dielectric can be used to generate very large effective index changes in a very compact dielectric waveguide. Modeling based on this theoretical analysis indicates modulator performance significantly better than the state of the art even without significant optimization. The rewards could be much bigger with careful optimization and design. However, there are significant unknowns that may limit these predictions. This proposal investigates the veracity of these ideas to see if graphene can be utilized for superior modulators that will be the work horse of next generation datacom and telecom applications. An experimental study will be performed to verify the predictions of this approach. Basic modulator structures will be fabricated and characterized to quantify effective index changes induced in graphene through external voltages. The results of this study are expected to be a fundamental contribution to basic science that describes graphene.

标题：基于新型材料Grapheneabstractnontechnical的光学调制器的研究：随着新应用程序的出现，例如社交媒体，在线医疗记录，云计算，通过Internet和数据中心传输的数据的天文学增加了。光纤技术是唯一可以按需传输如此大量信息的可行技术。这依赖于通过光纤传输光辐射。但是，信息几乎总是以电气形式获得。在光纤上传输电气信息需要光调节器。光学调节器施加了有关光辐射的电气信息，该光辐射将电气信息传输到光纤上。需要大量的光学调制器，并且希望非常紧凑，低功率消耗和低成本。此外，他们的技术应允许与其他设备集成形成高功能微芯片。该提案研究了这种调节剂在一种称为石墨烯的新型材料中的可能性。石墨烯是单层厚碳原子的排列。因此，拟议的努力有可能使社会受益，并通过使用光纤传输较低的成本，更高的性能数据传输对生活质量做出重大贡献。技术：该提案引入了高风险和高奖励方法，用于光学调制器。这是基于石墨烯的独特电磁特性。通常使用描述石墨烯电导率的理论公式表明，当改变石墨烯中的费米水平时，石墨烯介电常数的真实和虚构部分的巨大变化。这表明非常紧凑，有效的光学调制。特别是使用两个用薄电介质分离的石墨烯片可用于在非常紧凑的电介质波导中产生非常大的有效指数变化。基于此理论分析的建模表明，即使没有明显的优化，调制器的性能也明显好于最新技术。通过仔细的优化和设计，奖励可能会更大。但是，有很多未知数可能会限制这些预测。该提案调查了这些想法的真实性，以查看是否可以将石墨烯用于上级调节器，这将是下一代Datacom和电信应用程序的工作马。将进行一项实验研究以验证这种方法的预测。将制造和表征基本的调节器结构，以量化石墨烯中通过外部电压引起的有效指数变化。这项研究的结果预计将是描述石墨烯的基础科学的基本贡献。