ATHERMAL POLYMER OPTICAL WAVEGUIDE ON POLYMER SUBSTRATE

摘要

A planar optical waveguide is provided. The planar optical waveguide includes a polymer substrate (10) having a coefficient of thermal expansion, a first cladding (22) disposed on the substrate, and a core (24) disposed on at least a portion of the first cladding. The core is a halogenated polymer having an absorptive optical loss of less than approximately 2.5 x 10-4 dB/cm in the range from about 1250 to 1700 nm.. The core has a thermo-optic coefficient and a refractive index, a product of the thermo-optic coefficient and the reciprocal of the refractive index being approximately equal to the negative of the coefficient of thermal expansion.