High-Performance Heterogeneously Integrated Photodiodes for Microwave Photonics and Quantum Measurements

Light is widely used for communications, sensing, and, more recently, for quantum ap- plications. However, signal processing is still heavily dependent on electrical components. Therefore, the need for high performance photodiodes, that can convert optical signals into electrical signals, is inevitable. Over the last 20 years, integrated photonics has drawn attention owing to advantages of low loss, scalability, cost, functionality, and performance when compared to discrete components. By heterogeneous integration, advantages from different material systems become accessible all at once. This work presents high-performance (bandwidth, responsivity and saturation power) scalable heterogeneously integrated group III-V photodiodes on non-native platforms including thin-film lithium niobate (TFLN) and silicon nitride.

With the realization of heterogeneous integration of high-performance photodiodes, integrated photonics systems for different applications become available. This work also presents photonic systems enabled by heterogeneously integrated photodiodes.