Tsintzos, S.I.; Tsimvrakidis, K.; Gates, J.C.; Elshaari, A.W.; Smith, P.G.R.; Zwiller, V.; Riziotis, C. Coupling Nanowire Quantum Dots to Optical Waveguides by Microsphere-Induced Photonic Nanojet. Photonics2024, 11, 343.
Tsintzos, S.I.; Tsimvrakidis, K.; Gates, J.C.; Elshaari, A.W.; Smith, P.G.R.; Zwiller, V.; Riziotis, C. Coupling Nanowire Quantum Dots to Optical Waveguides by Microsphere-Induced Photonic Nanojet. Photonics 2024, 11, 343.
Tsintzos, S.I.; Tsimvrakidis, K.; Gates, J.C.; Elshaari, A.W.; Smith, P.G.R.; Zwiller, V.; Riziotis, C. Coupling Nanowire Quantum Dots to Optical Waveguides by Microsphere-Induced Photonic Nanojet. Photonics2024, 11, 343.
Tsintzos, S.I.; Tsimvrakidis, K.; Gates, J.C.; Elshaari, A.W.; Smith, P.G.R.; Zwiller, V.; Riziotis, C. Coupling Nanowire Quantum Dots to Optical Waveguides by Microsphere-Induced Photonic Nanojet. Photonics 2024, 11, 343.
Abstract
Silica on Silicon is a major optical integration platform, while the emergent class of integrated Laser written circuits' platform offers additionally high customizability, and flexibility for rapid prototyping. However, the inherent waveguides' low core/cladding refractive index contrast characteristic compared to other photonic platforms in silicon or silicon nitride, sets serious limitations for on-chip efficient coupling with single photon emitters, like semiconductor nanowires with quantum dots limiting the applications in quantum computing. A new light coupling scheme proposed here overcomes this limitation providing means for light coupling >50%. The scheme is based on the incorporation of an optical microsphere between the nanowire and the waveguide, properly optimized and arranged in terms of: size, refractive index, distance of microsphere between nanowire and waveguide. Upon suitable design of the optical arrangement, the photonic nanojet emitted by the illuminated microsphere excites efficiently the guided eigenmodes of the input channel waveguide, thus launching light with high coupling efficiency. The method is tolerant in displacements, misalignments, and imperfections and is fabricationally feasible by current state of the art techniques. The proposed method enables the on-chip multiple single photon emitters' integration thus allowing the development of highly customizable and scalable quantum photonic integrated circuits for quantum computing.
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