Development, calibration and characterization of silicon photonics based optical phased arrays

Over the last decade, Optical Phased Arrays (OPA) have been extensively studied, targeting applications such as Light Detection And Ranging (LiDAR) systems, holographic displays, atmospheric monitoring and free space communications. Leveraging the maturity of the silicon photonics platform, the usual mechanical based beam steering system could be replaced by an integrated OPA, significantly reducing the cost and size of the LiDAR while improving its performance (scanning speed, power efficiency, resolution) thanks to solid state beam steering. However, the realization of an OPA that meets the specifications of a LiDAR system (low divergence and single output beam) is not trivial. Targeting the realization of a complete LiDAR system, the technical challenges inherent to the development of high performance OPAs have been studied at CEA LETI. In particular, efficient genetic algorithms have been developed for the calibration of high channel count OPAs as well as an advanced measurement setup compatible with wafer-scale OPA characterization.