近日，瑞士苏黎世联邦理工学院Leuthold, Juerg团队研究了SiN平台上的等离子体BTO——用于光通信的200GBd以上调制。2025年12月16日，《光：科学与应用》杂志发表了这一成果。

一种集成了高速调制器与低损耗多功能无源器件的集成光子学平台，对于从人工智能到光纤通信中下一代Tbit/s链路等各类应用具有极高需求。

为此，研究组推出了用于高速电光调制器的等离子体BTO-on-SiN平台。该平台融合了低损耗氮化硅光子学的优势与高非线性钛酸钡作为活性材料的特性。纳米级等离子体技术使调制器能在高达110 GHz的电光带宽下工作，且活性区域长度可短至5微米。研究组在此展示了三种不同调制器：256 GBd C波段马赫-曾德尔调制器、224 GBd C波段IQ调制器（该器件既是首个BTO基IQ调制器，也是氮硅平台上首个用于数据通信的IQ调制器），以及200 GBd O波段环形谐振腔调制器。

通过这一技术途径，研究组实现了IQ调制器448 Gbit/s与马赫-曾德尔调制器340 Gbit/s的创纪录数据速率。此外，他们首次展示了基于BTO的等离子体环形谐振腔调制器，并阐明其如何通过仅2 dB的低器件损耗完美适配O波段低复杂度通信场景。该项研究充分发挥了氮化硅平台优势，展现了该技术在应对日益增长的高速调制器需求方面的巨大潜力。

附：英文原文

Title: The plasmonic BTO-on-SiN platform – beyond 200 GBd modulation for optical communications

Author: Kohli, Manuel, Chelladurai, Daniel, Kulmer, Laurenz, Blatter, Tobias, Horst, Yannik, Keller, Killian, Doderer, Michael, Winiger, Joel, Moor, David, Messner, Andreas, Buriakova, Tatiana, Convertino, Clarissa, Eltes, Felix, Fedoryshyn, Yuriy, Koch, Ueli, Leuthold, Juerg

Issue&Volume: 2025-12-16

Abstract: An integrated photonics platform that offers high-speed modulators in addition to low-loss and versatile passive components is highly sought after for different applications ranging from AI to next-generation Tbit/s links in optical fiber communication. For this purpose, we introduce the plasmonic BTO-on-SiN platform for high-speed electro-optic modulators. This platform combines the advantages provided by low-loss silicon nitride (SiN) photonics with the highly nonlinear barium titanate (BTO) as the active material. Nanoscale plasmonics enables high-speed modulators operating at electro-optical bandwidths up to 110GHz with active lengths as short as 5μm. Here, we demonstrate three different modulators: a 256GBd C-band Mach-Zehnder (MZ) modulator, a 224 GBd C-band IQ modulator – being both the first BTO IQ and the first IQ modulator on SiN for data communication – and finally, a 200GBd O-band racetrack (RT) modulator. With this approach we show record data rates of 448Gbit/s with the IQ modulator and 340Gbit/s with the MZ modulator. Furthermore, we demonstrate the first plasmonic RT modulator with BTO and how it is ideally suited for low complexity communication in the O-band with low device loss of 2dB. This work leverages the SiN platform and shows the potential of this technology to serve as a solution to combat the ever-increasing demand for fast modulators.

DOI: 10.1038/s41377-025-02116-1

Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41377-025-02116-1