Broadband opto-mechanical phase shifter for photonic integrated circuits

A broadband opto-mechanical phase shifter for photonic integrated circuits is proposed and numerically investigated. The structure consists of a mode-carrying waveguide and a deformable non-mode-carrying nanostring, which are parallel with each other. Since the nanostring can be deflected by the optical gradient force between the waveguide and the nanostring, the effective refractive indices of the waveguide will be changed and a phase shift will be generated. The phase shift under different geometry sizes, launched powers and boundary conditions are calculated and the dynamical properties as well as the thermal noise's effect are also discussed. It is demonstrated that a pi phase shift can be realized with only about 0.64 mW launched power and 50 mu m long nanostring. The proposed phase shifter may find potential usage in future investigation of photonic integrated circuits. (C) 2012 American Institute of Physics. [http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4746761]