CHIN. PHYS. LETT. Vol. 28, No.

7 (2011) 074202

A Compact and Highly Efficient Silicon-Based Asymmetric MachZehnder

Modulator with Broadband Spectral Operation *
ZHOU Liang()1 , LI Zhi-Yong()1** , XIAO Xi()1 , XU Hai-Hua()1 ,
FAN Zhong-Chao()2 , HAN Wei-Hua()2 , YU Yu-De()1 , YU Jin-Zhong()1
1

State Key Laboratory on Integrated Optoelectronics, Institute of Semiconductors, Chinese Academy of Sciences,
Beijing 100083
2
Engineering Research Center for Semiconductor Integrated Technology, Institute of Semiconductors,
Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100083

(Received 18 January 2011)

An asymmetric MachZehnder electro-optic modulator is demonstrated by using a silicon-based p-i-n diode
embedded in compact 200 m long phase shifters. The measured figure of merit = 0.23 Vmm shows highly
efficient modulation by the device, and an open eye-diagram at 3.2 Gbit/s confirmed its fast electro-optic response.
Integrated with the grating coupler, the device exhibits a broad operational wavelength range of 70 nm with a
uniform 18 dB extinction ratio covering the -band and part -band of optical communication.

PACS: 42.79.Ta, 42.82.Et, 42.79.Hp, 42.81.Qb

DOI: 10.1088/0256-307X/28/7/074202

The monolithically integrated photonic and electronic circuits attract significant interest to silicon
photonics, which are compatible with complementary
metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology and
considered as the low-cost efficient options for future
inter-chip optical interconnects.[1] One of the key components applied within optical interconnects is siliconbased optical modulators at high speed with high efficiency as well as at a low driving voltage for a compact
structure. Based on the carrier dispersion effect,[2] silicon electro-optic modulators have been demonstrated
by using carrier accumulation,[3] carrier injection[4]
and carrier depletion.[5] The p-i-n diode based optical modulators in majority carrier injection mode
have been proven to be highly efficient due to the
large index change and low optical absorption loss
for the optical mode in the intrinsic region.[6] Therefore a p-i-n based modulator can be operated at a
very low drive voltage. The modulator mostly employs the MachZehnder interferometer (MZI) configuration, utilizing the multi-mode interference (MMI)
for the optical splitter and combiner. This configuration has the advantages of broadband spectral operation, low environmental temperature sensitivity and
high fabrication tolerance.[7] In order to enable waferscale testing without cleaving and facet polishing, a
grating coupler serves as an attractive approach used
for in- and out-of-plane optical coupling between a
fiber and a sub-micron scale waveguide.[8,9] A grating
coupler with a proper structure can offer both high
coupling efficiency and large 3 dB bandwidth. However, the geometric parameters of the grating couplers are normally different from those of waveguides

used for MZI-based electro-optic modulators. Among

them, different etching depths should be considered
carefully for their geometries.
In this Letter, a compact, highly efficient siliconbased asymmetric MZI modulator is demonstrated.
The influence of etching depth on the characteristics
of a grating coupler and of an MZI electro-optic modulator is analyzed. Using a grating coupler, the device
is able to operate at a wide wavelength range with a
3 dB coupling bandwidth of 70 nm, central wavelength
1550 nm and uniform 18 dB extinction ratio (ER) covering the -band and part -band of optical communication. The value for the modulator with a
200-m-long phase shifter is 0.23 Vmm at a bias of
1.15 V. Utilizing a pre-emphasized electrical signal, a
clear eye diagram of optical NRZ modulation at transmission data rate up to 3.2 Gbit/s is observed.
The MZI modulator shown in Fig. 1(a) was demonstrated using a 1 2 MMI splitter and a 2 1
MMI combiner to enable broadband spectral operation with high ER as well as large fabrication tolerance. Two nanophotonic rib waveguides embedded
with p-i-n diodes to form two phase shifters are shown
in Fig. 1(b). The two phase shifters are the same as
each other to ensure the balance of the carrier induced
optical loss between them and therefore they obtain
high ER. The asymmetrical MZI arms are introduced
to simplify the optical characterization, with a 3.3 nm
free spacing range (FSR), by adding a 170 m arm
length difference.
When a forward-bias voltage is applied to the p-i-n
diode, a large number of majority carriers are forced
to inject into the intrinsic region and to bring a large

* Supported in part by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant No 60877036, and the National Basic
Research Program of China under Grant Nos 2006CB302803 and 2011CB301701.
** Correspondence author. Email: lizhy@semi.ac.cn
2011 Chinese Physical Society and IOP Publishing Ltd

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CHIN. PHYS. LETT. Vol. 28, No. 7 (2011) 074202

Grating
coupler

Grating
coupler

Phase shifter
200 mm

Output

Input

(a)
(b)

Al
SiO2
Si

dNdop
Pdop

Ndop

Cathode

Anode
Silica
cladding
P++

N+ ~1019 cm-3
N++ ~1020 cm-3
P+ ~1019 cm-3
P++ ~1020 cm-3

P+

Etching
depth

N+

N++

Box
Silicon substrate

Fig. 1. (a) A experimental top-view microscope figure of

the asymmetric MZI modulator with grating couplers, and
(b) a cross-section schematic diagram of the phase shifter
embedded with a p-i-n diode.

In order to enable wafer scale online testing, gratings were utilized as the optical interconnects between the sub-micron waveguides and optical fibers.
The CAMFR[11] based on the eigenmode expansion
method was used for the grating simulation. The influence of the etching depth on the coupling efficiency
at 1550 nm is shown in Fig. 2(b). For the grating coupler with a period of 620 nm and a filling factor of 0.5,
the highest coupling efficiency of 53.8% at 1550 nm
for TE mode and 3 dB bandwidth of 80 nm are theoretically predicted at a 200 nm etching depth, which

is different from the modulator waveguide, as mentioned. Therefore the gratings and waveguides need
to be defined by two steps of lithography and etching.

/ c m

( d B

( a )
0 . 2 4

m
3

0 . 2 1

( V

0 . 2 2

2
0 . 2 0
1

b s o r p t i o n

l o s s

0 . 2 3

0 . 2 5
7

0 . 1 9
1 8 0

2 0 0

2 2 0

2 4 0

2 6 0

2 8 0

( b )

e f f i c i e n c y

0 . 6

0 . 5

0 . 4

o u p l i n g

0 . 3

0 . 2

0 . 1

effective index change to the fundamental TE mode in

a rib waveguide. Therefore the overlay between the injection carrier and the optical mode is the key factor
in the modulation efficiency and the carrier induced
optical absorption loss. For a sub-micron wide rib
waveguide, the increase in etching depth corresponding to a thin slab layer is a promising way to enhance
the optical confinement in the rib region and hence to
increase the modulation efficiency. Meanwhile, higher
optical confinement in the rib region also indicates less
optical field in the slab layer and less carrier induced
optical absorption loss. This type of optical absorption loss is mainly contributed by the overlay between
the slab mode and the n-type or p-type heavy doping,
which is only a few hundreds of nanometers away from
the edges of the rib waveguides. Less carrier-induced
absorption loss makes it easier to obtain a large extinction ratio in an MZI configuration. The influence
of the etching depth (waveguide width is 500 nm) on
the modulation efficiency and the carrier-induced absorption loss is shown in Fig. 2(a). However, the single mode condition for a sub-micrometer waveguide[10]
limits the deep etching. Finally, a 240 nm etching
depth corresponding to a 100 nm slab layer is chosen
to obtain a high modulation efficiency (0.22 Vmm)
and low loss (2.7 dB/cm).

0 . 0
1 4 0

1 6 0

1 8 0

2 0 0

t c h i n g

2 2 0

d e p t h

2 4 0

( n m

2 6 0

2 8 0

Fig. 2. Influence of the etching depth on (a) the modulation efficiency ( ) and the carriers induced absorption
loss, and (b) the coupling efficiency of the grating coupler
at 1550 nm.

The MZI modulator integrated with a grating coupler is fabricated on a silicon-on-insulator (SOI) substrate with a 340-nm-thick top silicon layer and a 2m-thick buried oxide layer, which offers a high optical confinement capacity to form a sub-micron crosssection of a nanophotonic rib waveguide and a highly
efficient out-of-plane grating coupler. The fabricated
grating couplers, ground-signal-ground (GSG) electrodes on both arms of the modulator as well as the
asymmetric MZI scheme are shown in Fig. 1(a). The
passive components (splitters, combiners and grating
couplers) are patterned by E-beam lithography (EBL)
before the following inducted coupled plasma (ICP)
etching. First, the optical waveguides including MMIs
are defined by using a hydrogen silsesquioxane (HSQ)
negative EBL resist and etched at about 240 nm (measured by a step profiler). Then the grating couplers are
defined at the end of the waveguides by aligned EBL
exposure using a polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA)
positive resist and etched at about 200 nm. The scanning electron microscope (SEM) images of the optical
components of the MZI modulato, such as (a) and (b)
a grating coupler, (c) a 1 2 MMI splitter and (d) a
bending waveguide, are shown in Fig. 3.
The n+ and p+ doping regions were defined by a series of aligned EBL exposures. The distances between
the edges of the rib waveguides and n+ /p+ doping regions (shown as and in Fig. 1(b)) were both
carefully controlled to 300 nm to achieve high speed
and low loss operation. To compromise the modulation efficiency and the absorption loss, the doping
concentrations of n+ and p+ types are both 1019 cm3 .

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CHIN. PHYS. LETT. Vol. 28, No. 7 (2011) 074202

The ohmic contacts between the silicon slabs and aluminum electrodes are achieved by heavy doping, and
nickel-silicon alloy formation in the metal contact region follows the rapid thermal annealing (RTA) process.
Grating
coupler

Input
10 mm
(a)

(c)

(b)

(d)

Fig. 3. SEM images of the optical components of the MZI

modulator, such as (a) and (b) a grating coupler, (c) a 12
MMI splitter and (d) a bending waveguide.

Optical output (dB)

-10

(a)

3dB bandwidth
~70 nm

-20
-30

ing MMI optical waveguides. The measured FSR is

3.35 nm, which corresponds to the simulation result
very well, and indicates little waveguide cross-section
variety in the fabrication. The total insertion loss
of the device at around 1550 nm is 13.7 dB. The loss
mainly comes from the splitter/combiner (2 dB) and
coupling loss (11 dB), which is mostly induced by the
index and polarization mismatch between the grating
and fiber interfaces. The coupling loss can be further
improved by using polarization maintaining fibers and
adding a refractive index matching solution between
the fibers and gratings.
For the 200 m long phase shifter, the curve of
the device is shown in the inset in Fig. 4(b). Very low
differential resistance (20 ) is obtained, indicating
good ohmic contact in the silicon and aluminum interface. The normalized optical output power at a wavelength of 1550 nm as a function of the applied dc voltage is shown in Fig. 4(b). The optical power reaches
the lowest point at a very low bias of 1.15 V, corresponding to the figure of merit = 0.23 Vmm,
which is close to the simulation value (0.22 Vmm),
due to the low contact resistance with perfect fabrication. High modulation efficiency is achieved to be
33% more than that of the device in Ref. [4].

18 dB ER

-40

@1550 nm

-50
1500

1520

1540

1560

1 0

1580

1600

Normalized optical output

-10
-15
-20
0

Current (mA)

Normalized optical
output (dB)

(b)
50

-5

40
30
20

Resistance
~20 W

10
0

0.2

0.5

1.5

Voltage (V)

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.2

0.8

Wavelength (nm)
0

1.4

Applied voltage (V)

Fig. 4. (a) The optical transmission spectrum of an asymmetric MZI modulator integrated with grating couplers,
and (b) the normalized optical output power at wavelength
of 1550 nm as a function of applied voltage, inset: image
of curve.

Fiber-to-fiber measurement was set up to characterize the spectral transmission of MZI modulators
integrated with grating couplers. Two cleaved single mode fibers, respectively, connected to the lasers
and optical spectrum analyzer, were positioned above
the input and output grating at 10 with respect to
the vertical axis of the die. The optical transmission spectrum of the device is given in Fig. 3(a). The
measured 3 dB coupling bandwidth is 70 nm (1525
1595 nm) with the peak wavelength of 1550 nm, which
agrees with the simulation, covering the total band
and part band for optical communication. A highly
uniform extinction ratio of 18 dB is achieved in the entire 3 dB bandwidth, contributing from the low optical
loss in the two arms of the asymmetric MZI employ-

0.6

(a)

0.4
0.2
0
0
1

0.8
0.6
(b)

(c)

0.4
0.2

290 ps

300 ps
0
0

100

200

300

400

Time (ps)

100

200

300

400

Time (ps)

Fig. 5. (a) The optical NRZ modulation at a bit rate of

3.2 Gbit/s with a pre-emphasis electrical signal; the measured electro-optic response time of the MZI modulator:
(b) rise time (10% to 90% optical power) of 300 ps, (c)
fall time (90% to 10% optical power) of 290 ps.

In order to speed up the carriers injection and extraction, a pre-emphasis electrical signal was used to
drive the forward biased modulator embedded with
p-i-n diodes. This pre-emphasis signal was formed by
combining two channels of the NRZ signal with a time
delay and voltage amplitude difference between them,
and then applied on the electrodes of the MZI modulator by a GSG probe.[12] The electro-optic modulation
was measured by a high speed oscilloscope equipped
with a high bandwidth optical detector. The optical
NRZ modulation of the device is shown in Fig. 5(a),
driven by a pre-emphasis electrical signal with of

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CHIN. PHYS. LETT. Vol. 28, No. 7 (2011) 074202

4 V and a dc bias of 1.1 V at a bit rate of 3.2 Gbit/s.

The rise time (10% to 90% optical power) and
fall time (90% to 10% optical power) was measured to be 300 ps and 290 ps, respectively, as shown
in Figs. 5(b) and 5(c), indicating the theoretical operation rate of our device up to 3.2 Gbit/s. A clear optical
eye-diagram of a 3.2 Gbit/s transmission bit rate for
a 200-m-long phase shifter device at around 1550 nm
wavelength is shown in Fig. 6. Further improvement of
the modulation speed can be achieved by optimizing
the doping profile and adding a matching terminator
at the end of the electrodes.

100 ps

Fig. 6. Eye diagram of the NRZ optical signal for an MZI

modulator under a pre-emphasis electrical signal operating at a transmission bit rate of 3.2 Gbit/s.

In summary, a compact, highly efficient ( =

0.23 Vmm) SOI electro-optic MZI modulator integrated with a 200-m-long phase shifter and grating
coupler has been demonstrated for an on-chip optical
interconnect. The influence of etching depth on
of the MZI modulator nearly at 1550 nm has been investigated, and the coupling efficiency of the grating
coupler was also estimated. The measured 3 dB coupling bandwidth of 70 nm with a uniform distribution

extinction ratio of 18 dB covers the total -band and

part of the -band communication wavelength, confirming the broad operational wavelength range of the
device. A clear eye-diagram at a transmission rate
of 3.2 Gbit/s is obtained, ensuring high speed optical modulation. The fabrication process of the device is compatible with CMOS technology and with
an advantage that the measurement could be set up
for wafer-scale online testing by integrating it with
grating couplers.

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