Tunable slow and fast light in a silicon-on-insulator Fano resonator.

Tunable slow and fast light generation in a silicon-on-insulator (SOI) Fano resonator is proposed and experimentally demonstrated. The slow and fast light generation with symmetric and asymmetric coupling conditions of the Fano resonator is theoretically analyzed. Under a slightly imbalanced coupling condition, the two output ports of the Fano resonator could produce a fast light and a slow light, respectively. By utilizing the thermo-optic (TO) effect to change the phase difference of the two optical beams coupled into the resonator, the transition of fast and slow light can be realized at the fixed resonance wavelength. Experimental results show that a slow-to-fast transition (group delay from 0.852 to -1.057 ns) at one resonance wavelength, and a fast-to-slow transition (group delay from -0.22 to 0.867 ns) at another resonance wavelength are realized simultaneously by controlling the microheater to tune the phase difference.