Grants and Contributions:

Grant or Award spanning more than one fiscal year (2017-2018 to 2018-2019).

Silicon photonics is an enabling technology for large-scale photonic integration. There is a quickly growingx000D
number of silicon photonics users in Canadian universities and industry. One of the major changes in siliconx000D
photonics lies in the high insertion loss of fiber couplers due to the large mode mismatch between optical fiberx000D
and silicon waveguide. This is crucial as the fiber-to-chip coupling connects photonic integrated circuits tox000D
other devices and has significant impact on performance of the entire system. Grating-based surface couplersx000D
have been used for rapid prototyping of silicon photonic devices. However, they suffer from from high loss,x000D
narrow band and polarization dependancy. Many applications, such as telecommunications and opticalx000D
interconnects in data centres, require edge couplers for broadband, polarization-insensitive operation so that thex000D
chip can be coupled to standard single-mode optical fibers for data transmission. This project is to develop ax000D
reliable design of low-loss edge coupler that will be of fundamental importance for integrated photonicx000D
systems, enabling new innovation opportunities and faster iterations. In conclusion, this project will contributex000D
to Canada's leadership in photonics technology and potential economic benefits in a quickly growing marketx000D
with great opportunities.