Self-aligned packaging of an 8×8 InGaAsP-InP space switch

By using an efficient and alignment tolerant fiber-chip coupling technology we can realize semiconductor space switches with a new and highly promising modular architecture. We present a completely packaged 8/spl times/8 matrix switch based on InGaAsP-InP intended for routing applications around wavelength 1.55 /spl mu/m. The matrix is composed of sixteen 1/spl times/8 InGaAsP-InP switches that are optically interconnected by a shuffle comprising 64 single-mode fibers (SMFs). All the fiber ports of the InGaAsP-InP chips are provided with monolithically integrated optical spot-size transformers (MOSTs) that allow simple yet highly efficient self-aligned multifiber coupling. The 8/spl times/8 matrix shows a fiber-matrix-fiber insertion losses of 20 dB and a crosstalk suppressions of 28 dB. An extension of the matrix architecture to a 64/spl times/64 switch seems straightforward.