Thermally Tunable GeSi Electro-Absorption Modulator with a Wide Effective Operating Wavelength Range

We demonstrate a GeSi electro-absorption modulator with on-chip thermal tuning for the first time, to the best of our knowledge. Theoretical simulation proves that the device temperature can be tuned and the effective operating wavelength range can be broadened. When the heater power is 4.63 mW, the temperature of the waveguide increases by about 27 K and the theoretical operating wavelength range is broadened by 23.7 nm. The experimental results show that the optical transmission line shifted to the longer wavelength by 4.8 nm by every 1 mW heater power. The effective static operating wavelength range of the device is increased from 34.4 nm to 60.1 nm,which means it is broadened by 25.7 nm. The band edge shift coefficient of 0.76 nm/K is obtained by temperature simulation and linear fitting of the measured data. The device has a 3 dB EO bandwidth of 89 GHz at 3 V reverse bias, and the eye diagram measurement shows a data rate of 80 Gbit/s for non-return-to-zero on–off keying modulation and 100 Gbit/s for 4 pulse amplitude modulation in the 1526.8 nm to 1613.2 nm wavelength range as the heater power increases from 0 mW to 10.1 mW.