We present our latest progresses on the development of integrated photonic devices as well as microfluidic chips of unprecedented characteristics and performances using femtosecond laser micromachining. We demonstrate ultra-high Q microresonators in lithium niobate on insulator (LNOI), on-chip micro-laser and waveguide amplifier, and high-throughput micro-chemical reactor. The achievements are the result of persistent effort on improving the precision and efficiency in ultrafast laser processing.
Recently, low-loss (0.027 dB/cm) ridge waveguides have been demonstrated on lithium niobate on insulator (LNOI) by laser patterning followed by chemo-mechanical polishing. However, the fabricated waveguide supports multi-mode propagation due to the relatively large cross-sectional dimensions. Here, we report conversion of the multi-mode LNOI waveguides into single mode waveguides with a mode field size of ~2.5 μm with a cladding layer of Ta2O5. The propagation loss of the single mode waveguide is measured to be ~0.042 dB/cm. Most importantly, we show that this fabrication approach has allowed to fabricate meter-length long LNOI single mode waveguides of low propagation loss.
The realization of micro-disk resonators (MDRs) of high quality (Q) factors using lithium niobate on insulator (LNOI) as the substrate has spurred great interest in developing on-chip nanophotonic structures which hold the promise for efficient nonlinear wavelength conversion, fast electrooptic light modulation, and high density photonic integration. Here, we report on fabrication of crystalline lithium niobate microresonators with quality factors above 10^7 as measured around 770 nm wavelength, which is almost one order of magnitude higher than the state-of-the-art Q factors around the visible and near-infrared wavelengths reported so far. Our fabrication process includes four steps. First, a thin layer of chromium (Cr) was deposited on the surface of the LNOI by thermal evaporation coating. Subsequently, the Cr film on the LNOI sample was patterned into a circular disk using space-selective femtosecond laser direct writing. Next, the chemo-mechanical (CM) polishing process was performed to fabricate LN MDRs by a wafer polishing machine, the surface smoothness is greatly improved by the CM polishing process, leading to a significant increase of the Q factor. Finally, the fabricated structure was first immersed in Cr etching solution, and then underwent a chemical wet etching in a buffered hydrofluoric acid (HF) solution to partially remove the SiO_2 layer beneath the LN microdisk to produce the freestanding LN MDRs. We have also demonstrated nonlinear processes including second harmonic generation and Raman scattering in our LN MDRs.
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