All-optical frequency division on-chip using a single laser.

The generation of spectrally pure microwave signals is a critical functionality in fundamental and applied sciences, including metrology and communications. Optical frequency combs enable the powerful technique of optical frequency division (OFD) to produce microwave oscillations of the highest quality1,2. Current implementations of OFD require multiple lasers, with space- and energy-consuming optical stabilization and electronic feedback components, resulting in device footprints incompatible with integration into a compact and robust photonic platform3-5. Here we demonstrate all-optical OFD on a photonic chip by synchronizing two distinct dynamical states of Kerr microresonators pumped by a single continuous-wave laser. The inherent stability of the terahertz beat frequency between the signal and idler fields of an optical parametric oscillator is transferred to a microwave frequency of a Kerr soliton comb, and synchronization is achieved via a coupling waveguide without the need for electronic locking. OFD factors of N = 34 and 468 are achieved for 227 GHz and 16 GHz soliton combs, respectively. In particular, OFD enables a 46 dB phase-noise reduction for the 16 GHz soliton comb, resulting in the lowest microwave noise observed in an integrated photonics platform. Our work represents a simple, effective approach for performing OFD and provides a pathway towards chip-scale devices that can generate microwave frequencies comparable to the purest tones produced in metrological laboratories.

Real-time vibrations of a carbon nanotube.

The field of miniature mechanical oscillators is rapidly evolving, with emerging applications including signal processing, biological detection1 and fundamental tests of quantum mechanics2. As the dimensions of a mechanical oscillator shrink to the molecular scale, such as in a carbon nanotube resonator3-7, their vibrations become increasingly coupled and strongly interacting8,9 until even weak thermal fluctuations could make the oscillator nonlinear10-13. The mechanics at this scale possesses rich dynamics, unexplored because an efficient way of detecting the motion in real time is lacking. Here we directly measure the thermal vibrations of a carbon nanotube in real time using a high-finesse micrometre-scale silicon nitride optical cavity as a sensitive photonic microscope. With the high displacement sensitivity of 700 fm Hz-1/2 and the fine time resolution of this technique, we were able to discover a realm of dynamics undetected by previous time-averaged measurements and a room-temperature coherence that is nearly three orders of magnitude longer than previously reported. We find that the discrepancy in the coherence stems from long-time non-equilibrium dynamics, analogous to the Fermi-Pasta-Ulam-Tsingou recurrence seen in nonlinear systems14. Our data unveil the emergence of a weakly chaotic mechanical breather15, in which vibrational energy is recurrently shared among several resonance modes-dynamics that we are able to reproduce using a simple numerical model. These experiments open up the study of nonlinear mechanical systems in the Brownian limit (that is, when a system is driven solely by thermal fluctuations) and present an integrated, sensitive, high-bandwidth nanophotonic interface for carbon nanotube resonators.

Absorption and scattering limits of silicon nitride integrated photonics in the visible spectrum.

Visible-light photonic integrated circuits (PICs) promise scalability for technologies such as quantum information, biosensing, and scanning displays, yet extending large-scale silicon photonics to shorter wavelengths has been challenging due to the higher losses. Silicon nitride (SiN) has stood out as the leading platform for visible photonics, but the propagation losses strongly depend on the film's deposition and fabrication processes. Current loss measurement techniques cannot accurately distinguish between absorption and surface scattering, making it difficult to identify the dominant loss source and reach the platform's fundamental limit. Here we demonstrate an ultra-low loss, high-confinement SiN platform that approaches the limits of absorption and scattering across the visible spectrum. Leveraging the sensitivity of microresonators to loss, we probe and discriminate each loss contribution with unparalleled sensitivity, and derive their fundamental limits and scaling laws as a function of wavelength, film properties and waveguide parameters. Through the design of the waveguide cross-section, we show how to approach the absorption limit of the platform, and demonstrate the lowest propagation losses in high-confinement SiN to date across the visible spectrum. We envision that our techniques for loss characterization and minimization will contribute to the development of large-scale, dense PICs that redefine the loss limits of integrated platforms across the electromagnetic spectrum.

Influence of discontinuities on photonic waveguides.

Fabrication-induced imperfections in photonic wire waveguides, such as roughness, stitching errors, and discontinuities, degrade their performance and thereby lower the yield of large-scale systems. This degradation is primarily due to the high insertion losses induced by imperfections, which scale nonlinearly with the index contrast in wire waveguides. Here we investigate the influence of discontinuities in photonic waveguides and later show a platform that is robust to fabrication imperfections. Our platform is based on an array of silicon nano-pillars, arranged to form a sub-wavelength (SW) grating waveguide. We focus on investigating the robustness by considering an abrupt break in the waveguide, as an extreme case of discontinuity. We show that sub-wavelength silicon waveguides are robust against unwanted large discontinuities relative to the operating wavelength. We measure a transmission loss of <2.2 dB at 1550 n m, for a discontinuity of length 2.1 µ m, when compared to more than 7 d B of loss in conventional silicon wire waveguides for the same discontinuity. Our results show that this mode of protection is broadband, covering the entire telecommunication band (λ =1500-1600 nm). We believe that this investigation of the influence of discontinuities in photonic waveguides could be a step toward the realization of low-loss optical waveguides.

Quantum state tomography in a third-order integrated optical parametric oscillator.

We measured the covariance matrix of the fields generated in an integrated third-order optical parametric oscillator operating above threshold. We observed up to (2.3 ± 0.3) dB of squeezing in amplitude difference and inferred (4.9 ± 0.7) dB of on-chip squeezing, while an excess of noise for the sum of conjugated quadratures hinders the entanglement. The degradation of amplitude correlations and state purity for increasing the pump power is consistent with the observed growth of the phase noise of the fields, showing the necessity of strategies for phase noise control aiming at entanglement generation in these systems.

Battery-operated integrated frequency comb generator.

Optical frequency combs are broadband sources that offer mutually coherent, equidistant spectral lines with unprecedented precision in frequency and timing for an array of applications1. Frequency combs generated in microresonators through the Kerr nonlinearity require a single-frequency pump laser and have the potential to provide highly compact, scalable and power-efficient devices2,3. Here we demonstrate a device-a laser-integrated Kerr frequency comb generator-that fulfils this potential through use of extremely low-loss silicon nitride waveguides that form both the microresonator and an integrated laser cavity. Our device generates low-noise soliton-mode-locked combs with a repetition rate of 194 gigahertz at wavelengths near 1,550 nanometres using only 98 milliwatts of electrical pump power. The dual-cavity configuration that we use combines the laser and microresonator, demonstrating the flexibility afforded by close integration of these components, and together with the ultra low power consumption should enable production of highly portable and robust frequency and timing references, sensors and signal sources. This chip-based integration of microresonators and lasers should also provide tools with which to investigate the dynamics of comb and soliton generation.

Fabrication-robust silicon photonic devices in standard sub-micron silicon-on-insulator processes.

Perturbations to the effective refractive index from nanometer-scale fabrication variations in waveguide geometry plague high index-contrast photonic platforms; this includes the ubiquitous sub-micron silicon-on-insulator (SOI) process. Such variations are particularly troublesome for phase-sensitive devices, such as interferometers and resonators, which exhibit drastic changes in performance as a result of these fabrication-induced phase errors. In this Letter, we propose and experimentally demonstrate a design methodology for dramatically reducing device sensitivity to silicon width variations. We apply this methodology to a highly phase-sensitive device, the ring-assisted Mach-Zehnder interferometer (RAMZI), and show comparable performance and footprint to state-of-the-art devices, while substantially reducing stochastic phase errors from etch variations. This decrease in sensitivity is directly realized as energy savings by significantly reducing the required corrective thermal tuning power, providing a promising path toward ultra-energy-efficient large-scale silicon photonic circuits.

Active tuning of dispersive waves in Kerr soliton combs.

Kerr soliton combs operate in the anomalous group-velocity dispersion regime through the excitation of dissipative solitons. The generated bandwidth is largely dependent on the cavity dispersion, with higher-order dispersion contributing to dispersive-wave (DW) generation that allows for power enhancement of the comb lines at the wings of the spectrum. However, the spectral position of the DW is highly sensitive to the overall cavity dispersion, and the inevitable dimension variations that occur during the fabrication process result in deviations in the DW emission wavelength. Here, we demonstrate active tuning of the DW wavelength, enabling post-fabrication spectral shaping of the soliton spectrum. We control the DW position by introducing a wavelength-controllable avoided mode crossing through actively tuning the resonances of a silicon nitride coupled microresonator via integrated heaters. We demonstrate DW tuning over 113 nm with a spectral power that can exceed the peak soliton spectral power. In addition, our modeling reveals buildup and enhancement of the DW in the auxiliary resonator, indicating that the mode hybridization arising from the strong coupling between the two resonators is critical for DW formation.

2D beam steerer based on metalens on silicon photonics.

Beam steering with solid-state devices represents the cutting-edge technology for next-generation LiDARs and free-space communication transceivers. Here we demonstrate a platform based on a metalens on a 2D array of switchable silicon microring emitters. This platform enables scalable, efficient, and compact devices that steer in two dimensions using a single wavelength. We show a field of view of 12.4° × 26.8° using an electrical power of less than 83 mW, offering a solution for practical miniature beam steerers.

Conversion efficiency of soliton Kerr combs.

We investigate the conversion efficiency (CE) of soliton modelocked Kerr frequency combs. Our analysis reveals three distinct scaling regimes of CE with the cavity free spectral range (FSR), which depends on the relative contributions of the coupling and propagation loss to the total cavity loss. Our measurements, for the case of critical coupling, verify our theoretical prediction over a range of FSRs and pump powers. Our numerical simulations also indicate that mode crossings have an adverse effect on the achievable CE. Our results indicate that microresonator combs operating with spacings in the electronically detectable regime are highly inefficient, which could have implications for integrated Kerr comb devices.