Wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) optical interconnect technology offers an effective solution for addressing the ever-increasing data traffic. Microring modulators (MRMs), owing to their high bandwidth, compact footprint, and inherent wavelength selectivity, have become key building blocks in WDM systems. However, the limited free spectral range (FSR) of MRMs restricts the number of available wavelength channels and the corresponding overall data rate capacity in WDM systems. In this study, we propose an optimized Bezier-bent MRM, in which the device radius is reduced to 3 μm to significantly enhance the FSR. The proposed MRM operates without the need for a DC bias voltage and an RF amplifier, exhibiting a low insertion loss of 0.4 dB, an ultrawide FSR exceeding 4 THz, and a high electro-optic bandwidth of over 110 GHz. Back-to-back (BtB) transmission experiments demonstrate that the modulator supports 400 Gbps PAM-8 data transmission under a driving voltage of only 1 V, satisfying the 7% hard-decision forward error correction (HD-FEC) bit-error-rate (BER) threshold of 3.8 × 10–3. Owing to the compact-radius design, the junction capacitance is substantially reduced, enabling an exceptionally low modulation power consumption of 0.2 fJ/bit. The proposed MRM presents significant potential for dense integration in future optical communication systems.
Wang et al. (Tue,) studied this question.