Differential Drive I/Q Modulator Based on Silicon Photonic Electro-Absorption Modulators

We demonstrate up to 100 Gbaud quadrature-amplitude modulated (QAM) signal generation with monolithic silicon in-phase quadrature (I/Q)-modulator based on silicon-germanium (SiGe) electro-absorption modulators (EAM). The modulator is in a differentially driven Mach-Zehnder (MZ) interferometric configuration similar to the conventional MZ modulator (MZM) based (I/Q) modulators. In particular, single-polarization quadrature phase-shift keying (SP-QPSK) signaling at symbol rates of 100 Gbaud with BERs below the hard-decision forward error correction (FEC) limit is shown. SP-QPSK optical signal generation and transmission over 80 km single-mode fiber (SMF) are demonstrated at symbol rates of 50 Gbaud with BER of less than 10(-5). The effect of the frequency roll-off used for Nyquist pulse shaping with raised cosine frequency response is studied for SP-QPSK 50 Gbaud signals. Furthermore, 16QAM signals at symbol rates of 50 Gbaud are generated.