DMREF: Magneto-electro-optically coupled hybrid metamaterial thin film platform for photonic integrated circuits

DMREF：用于光子集成电路的磁电光耦合混合超材料薄膜平台

• 批准号: 2323752
• 负责人: Haiyan Wang
• 金额: $ 199.99万
• 依托单位: Purdue University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-10-01 至 2027-09-30
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2323752&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: DMREF; Magneto; electro; optically; coupled

Non-technical Description: Unlike electronic circuits, photonic integrated circuits (PICs) use photons (small, discrete packets of light), rather than electrons, to transmit and process information. While photons provide higher transmission speeds and information capacity, achieving directed signal transmission, optical isolation, and switching remain critical challenges with current weakly-nonlinear materials. Despite silicon providing an established platform for low-cost, high-volume manufacturing, integrating many dissimilar materials on top poses significant processing and materials compatibility challenges. This Designing Materials to Revolutionize and Engineer our Future (DMREF) award supports research to develop a class of novel hybrid materials (consisting of two constituents at the nanoscale), which will ultimately form several key building blocks for universal, large-scale PICs. These new hybrid materials provide tailorable optical properties, well-coupled functionalities, easy integration at the device level, and compatibility with semiconductor manufacturing. The scope of the work provides the foundation for a PIC platform that can be manufactured at scale, actualizing the benefits of photon-based circuits, which include: higher speed, lower temperature sensitivity, large integration capacity, and lower costs and carbon footprint, compared to typical integrated circuit (IC) devices. These advances will provide vital new capabilities in telecommunications, healthcare, sensing, etc., to address critical needs in the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) and Science Act through highly efficient device concepts and manufacturing approaches. Furthermore, the research findings will be incorporated into student research training at both graduate and undergraduate levels and education modules for a co-developed course and summer research programs for high school teachers and students.Technical Description: The scientific goal of the DMREF project is to advance understanding of electro-optical and magneto-optical coupling effects in complex nanoscale hybrid metamaterials with a two-phase hybrid thin film platform to harness the coupling mechanisms between charges, spins, and photons. The technological goal is to demonstrate several key building blocks for future large-scale PICs, including highly efficient and integrated optical switches, nonreciprocal devices, and magneto-optic sensors for PICs, as a proof of concept for this new hetero-integration paradigm. Specifically, the project will develop a novel hybrid thin film platform with alloyed nanopillars in a dielectric (e.g., BaTiO3) matrix that simultaneously exhibits a magneto-optic effect, an electro-optic effect, and a plasmonic effect, potentially offering the versatility in achieving optical switching and one-way transmission enhanced by plasmonic effects. Echoing the Materials Genome Initiative’s call for “integrating experiment, computation, and theory,” the project creates an effective feedback loop platform by combining experimental efforts (hybrid materials growth, optical property characterization, and device integration and demonstration), theory and modeling (CALculation of PHAse Diagrams (CALPHAD) + phase field modeling (PFM) and mesoscale electromagnetic modeling), and expedited materials prediction and model properties estimation to accelerate the hybrid metamaterial design process. Major research tasks include: (1) to explore alloyed metallic phase designs for enhanced magneto-optical coupling in metal-oxide hybrid systems and measure on-chip coupling properties; (2) to implement strain engineering for enhanced electro-optical coupling in oxide-based hybrid systems and demonstrate on-chip modulation and device trimming; and (3) to characterize and integrate hybrid systems to form optical devices for potential optical isolation, switching and sensing.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

非技术描述：与电子电路不同，光子集成电路（PIC）使用光子（小的、离散的光包）而不是电子来传输和处理信息，而光子提供更高的传输速度和信息容量，实现定向信号传输。尽管硅为低成本、大批量制造提供了成熟的平台，但在顶部集成许多不同的材料却带来了重大的加工和材料兼容性挑战。革新和设计未来的材料 (DMREF) 奖支持开发一类新型混合材料（由两种纳米级成分组成）的研究，该材料最终将形成通用、大规模 PIC 的几个关键构建模块。材料提供可定制的光学特性、良好耦合的功能、器件级的轻松集成以及与半导体制造的兼容性。工作范围为可大规模制造的 PIC 平台奠定了基础，实现了基于光子的优势。与典型的集成电路（IC）器件相比，这些进步包括：更高的速度、更低的温度敏感性、更大的集成容量以及更低的成本和碳足迹，这些进步将为电信、医疗保健、传感等领域提供重要的新功能。通过高效的设备概念和制造方法来满足《创造有用的半导体生产激励措施》（CHIPS）和《科学法案》中的关键需求。此外，研究成果将纳入研究生和本科生的学生研究培训以及教育模块中。共同开发课程和暑期课程高中教师和学生的研究项目。技术描述：DMREF 项目的科学目标是通过两相混合薄膜平台加深对复杂纳米级混合超材料中电光和磁光耦合效应的理解，以利用技术目标是展示未来大规模 PIC 的几个关键构建模块，包括高效集成光开关、不可逆器件和 PIC 磁光传感器。具体来说，该项目将开发一种新型混合薄膜平台，该平台在电介质（例如 BaTiO3）基质中具有合金纳米柱，同时表现出磁光效应，即电光效应。效应和等离子体效应，可能提供通过等离子体效应增强的光学切换和单向传输的多功能性，呼应了材料基因组倡议“整合实验，计算和理论”，该项目通过结合实验工作（混合材料生长、光学特性表征以及器件集成和演示）、理论和建模（PHAse 图计算 (CALPHAD) + 相场建模（ PFM）和介观电磁建模），以及加速材料预测和模型特性估计，以加速混合超材料设计过程主要研究任务包括：（1）探索增强的合金金属相设计。金属氧化物混合系统中的磁光耦合并测量片上耦合特性；(2) 实施应变工程以增强氧化物混合系统中的电光耦合，并演示片上调制和器件微调；(3) ）表征和集成混合系统，形成用于潜在光隔离、开关和传感的光学器件。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优点和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。