Coupled fiber taper extraction of 1.53 μm photoluminescence from erbium doped silicon nitride photonic crystal cavities

Optical fiber tapers are used to collect photoluminescence emission at similar to 1.5 mu m from photonic crystal cavities fabricated in erbium doped silicon nitride on silicon. In the experiment, photoluminescence collection via one arm of the fiber taper is enhanced 2.5 times relative to free space collection, corresponding to a net collection efficiency of 4%. Theoretically, the collection efficiency into one arm of the fiber-taper with this material system and cavity design can be as high as 12.5%, but the degradation of the experimental coupling efficiency relative to this value mainly comes from scattering loss within the short taper transition regions. By varying the fiber taper offset from the cavity, a broad tuning range of coupling strength and collection efficiency is obtained. This material system combined with fiber taper collection is promising for building on-chip optical amplifiers. (C) 2010 Optical Society of America