Photodetectors for High-Speed and High-Power Applications

Who: Dr. Andreas Beling, Univ. of Virginia, Dept. of Elect. & Comp. Engineering

When: 11am, Monday, March 17th, 2014

Where: ESB 1001 (Eng. Sciences Bldg.)

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Summary: Photodetectors continue to play a crucial role in fiber optic communication systems and microwave photonics as applications demand higher bandwidths, larger power levels, and increased spectral efficiencies. High-speed, high-power photodetectors are needed as conventional top-illuminated p-i-n photodiodes cannot achieve the requisite bandwidth-efficiency products, while output power levels cause a move to side-illuminated waveguide photodiodes, photodiode arrays, and novel epitaxial layer structures. Furthermore, photodetectors incorporated into photonic integrated circuits enable more complex receiver architectures for the detection of advanced modulation formats guaranteeing the highest performance and packing density at the lowest cost.

In my talk, I provide a brief introduction to photodiode fundamentals, considerations of material systems and basic structures. I present state-of-the-art 145 GHz-waveguide photodiodes and high-power photodetector arrays that have been successfully operated at bitrates as high as 160 Gbit/s and discuss the development of an integrated dual-polarization coherent receiver that has become a key component in today’s 100 Gbit/s and emerging 400 Gbit/s fiber optic links. I cover novel device structures and photodiode arrays that enabled photonic generation of highly linear microwave signals at record-high output power levels. This includes heterogeneously integrated InP-based photodiodes on silicon that achieved the highest saturation current-bandwidth products on a silicon photonics platform to date. 

Bio:  Dr. Andreas Beling received the Dipl.-Phys. degree (M.S.) in physics from the University of Bonn, Germany, in 2000 and the Dr.-Ing. degree (Ph.D.) in electrical engineering from Technical University Berlin, Germany, in 2006. He was a staff scientist in the photonics division at the Heinrich-Hertz-Institut in Berlin in 2001-2006, a Research Associate in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Virginia in 2006-2008, and has two years of industry experience as a project manager working on optoelectronic receivers for high-speed fiber optic communication systems. He returned to University of Virginia in late 2010 as a Research Scientist and became Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at U.Va in 2013. His research interests include high-speed photodiodes, photonic integration technologies, and optoelectronic receivers for digital communications. Andreas Beling has authored or co-authored more than 100 technical papers, two book chapters, and three patents. He is a member of the IEEE Photonics Society and the Optical Society of America. 

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