Low loss etchless silicon photonic waveguides

We demonstrate low loss silicon waveguides fabricated without any silicon etching. We define the waveguides by selective oxidation which produces ultra-smooth sidewalls with width variations of 0.3 nm. The waveguides have a propagation loss of 0.3 dB/cm at 1.55 mu m. The waveguide geometry enables low bending loss of approximately 0.007 dB/bend for a 90 degrees bend with a 50 mu m bending radius.(C) 2009 Optical Society of America