Abstract-We investigate nonlinear carrier dynamics in a multiquantum-well semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) in the context of ultrafast all-optical logic. A rate-equation model is presented that accounts for two-photon absorption, free-carrier absorption, self-and cross phase modulation, carrier heating, spectral, spatial hole burning, and self-and cross polarization modulation. The nonlinear refractive index dynamics is investigated theoretically and experimentally. We find nonlinear phase changes larger than radians, which recovers on a timescale in the order of 1 ps. We also investigate a nonlinear AND gate that consists of an SOA that is placed in an asymmetric Mach-Zehnder interferometer. We show that the gate can be operated using 800-fJ optical pulses with duration of 200 fs while having a contrast ratio larger than 11 dB.Index Terms-Optical logic, optical signal processing ultrafast carrier dynamics, semiconductor optical amplifier.

We report an ultrafast cross phase modulation (XPM) effect in intersubband transition (ISBT) of InGaAs/AlAs/AlAsSb coupled quantum wells, where the ISBT absorption of a transverse-magnetic mode pump signal induces phase modulation of a transverse-electric mode probe signal. Using waveguide-type ISBT devices, we have achieved XPM-based 10 Gbit/s wavelength conversion with a power penalty of 2.53 dB. Also, we propose XPM-based signal processing circuits for gate switching and modulation format conversion.

We have developed a Mach-Zehnder interferometric all-optical switch employing intersubband transition in an InGaAs∕AlAs∕AlAsSb-coupled double quantum well waveguide. The recently discovered cross-phase modulation phenomenon was utilized as the switching mechanism; the nonlinear index of refraction for transverse electric polarized light is induced by intersubband optical excitation using transverse magnetic pump light. We demonstrate the demultiplexing operation of 160Gbit∕s data signals to 10Gbit∕s using this switch. At the input control pulse energy of 8pJ, the demultiplexed signals showed an extinction ratio better than 10dB, and an error-free demultiplexing was achieved.

We report good phase controllability and high production yield in Si-nanowire-based multistage delayed Mach-Zehnder interferometer-type optical multiplexers/demultiplexers (MUX/DeMUX) fabricated by an ArF-immersion lithography process on a 300 mm silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafer. Three kinds of devices fabricated in this work exhibit clear 1×4 Ch wavelength filtering operations for various optical frequency spacing. These results are promising for their applications in high-density wavelength division multiplexing-based optical interconnects.

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