Multicore-Fiber Receptacle With Compact Fan-In/Fan-Out Device for SDM Transceiver Applications

We describe a new multicore fiber (MCF) receptacle for space division multiplexing (SDM) based transceiver applications, in which we integrated a compact fiber-bundle type fan-in/fan-out device for directly connecting MCF to LDs and PDs. We design the length of the fan-out fibers taking their bending stress into account to achieve a configuration with a smaller footprint. With the proposed receptacle, we develop a 100 Gb/s SDM transmitter based on a four-channel, 1.3 μm membrane laser array on Si, in which spot-size convertor (SSC) using inverse taper InP and SiON waveguides is integrated. Since the core size of SiON waveguide is much smaller than that of MCF, we utilize different fibers with optimized modal fields at each connection point and introduce thermally-expanded-core (TEC) fusion splicing to realize a low-loss connection between them. We achieve a pluggable connection between the lasers and 125 μm-cladding 4-core MCF in an LC connector. The developed receptacle maintained satisfactory laser characteristics including sufficient output power and clear eye openings for directly modulated 28 Gb/s NRZ signals. We also achieve an error-free transmission at a bit-error rate of less than 10-12with a 500-m MCF transmission link for all 4 channels with simultaneous 4-channel operation.