Optical integrated circuit comprising light path turning micro-mirror inside the optical waveguide and method of manufacturing the same

An optical integrated circuit comprises optical waveguides, grooves formed by etching the upper cladding layer, the core layer and all or parts of the lower cladding layer close to a end section of the optical waveguide to intercept light transmitted through the core layer of the optical waveguide or to couple light into the core layer, a plurality of bonding pads formed around the groove, micro-mirrors and active optical elements. Such a PLC based optical integrated circuit and a method of manufacturing the same provides a low-cost manufacturing of optical integrated circuits and high quality mirrors for vertical optical coupling scheme.

RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims the benefit of priority of Korean Patent Application No. 10-2015-0022625 filed Feb. 13, 2015, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.

FIELD AND BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to an optical integrated circuit and a method of manufacturing the same. More particularly it relates to a PLC based optical integrated circuit including a light path turning micro-mirror inside the optical waveguide and a method of the same.

2. Description of the Related Art

The transmission capacity of optical communication system and optical interconnection apparatus has been continuously increased to meet the rising demand of wired/wireless communication traffic. A transmission distance of an optical cable decreases as data rate increases same as a copper cable. Accordingly new transmission technologies such as a multi lane transmission techniques and a higher order modulation technique in combination with a coherent detection technique has been developed.

Among the above technologies, the multi lane transmission technique is divided into two groups; (1) increasing the number of physical transmission paths and, (2) a wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) technology which transmits optical signal having a plurality of different wavelengths through a single optical fiber.

A transmission method using a multiple optical fiber is economical when the transmission distance is very short, for example, equal to or less than several hundred meters. However, when the transmission distance is longer than that the WDM technique is more economical.

A typical WDM system includes optical transmitters and optical receivers which convert electrical signal to light signal and light signal to electrical signal, respectively. Optical transmitters include a plurality of light sources each of them generating a different wavelength of lights and a multiplexer (MUX) which combines the lights having different wavelengths and sends its output to optical fibers. Optical receivers include a demultiplexer (DMUX) which spatially separates the muxed light signal into multiple light channels depending on the pre-determined wavelengths and a plurality of photodetectors receiving the light signals from each separated light channels and converting the light signal to electrical signal.

An arrayed waveguide grating (AWG) is one of the most popular MUX and DMUX device with a MUX/DMUX based on thin film filter technology. An AWG is also one of a key component consisting a planar lightwave circuit (PLC). AWGs can be made with a variety of materials including polymer, silicon oxide (SiOx), or silica on silicon or glass substrate. Among them, silica on silicon or glass has been the most widely used for the manufacturing of AWGs because it has lowest insertion loss. Wherein, the PLC means a lightwave circuit having optical waveguides for active or passive components in which a propagation path of a lightwave signal is substantially parallel to the surface of the lightwave circuit. The PLC is an essential element of a hybrid and monolithic optical integrated circuits.

In optical telecommunication systems, laser diodes and photodetectors are the most representative electrical-optical (E-O) and optical-electrical (O-E) conversion devices, respectively. Among photodetectors, surface illuminated type photodetectors which have a light detection active region on the surface is more common than alternative waveguide type photodetectors.

A vertical cavity surface emitting laser (VCSEL) is a surface emitting type light source emitting light from the front surface. Conventionally, there are two different types of optical coupling scheme between a PLC and surface illuminated type photodetectors or surface emitting type lasers. One is a parallel optical coupling scheme which maintains a light path parallel to a substrate and the other one is an edge optical coupling scheme which transforms a light path perpendicularly to a substrate.

The optical coupling scheme between photodetectors and a PLC, and between VCSELs and a PLC have the same basic principle except they have opposite in/out paths to each other. And thus, hereinafter, light coupling structures between a PLC and photodetectors will be described in detail.

In parallel optical coupling scheme between a DMUX AWG and surface illuminated type photodetectors, photodetectors are mounted perpendicularly in front of an end face of optical waveguides in order to receive lights from output waveguides of DMUX AWG. In general, the photodetectors and VCSELs have very thin thickness of about 0.1 mm to 0.2 mm, therefore it is difficult to mount the chip itself on a substrate. Therefore, photodetectors are usually attached on a third submount having an appropriate area and thickness and then the submount is vertically mounted in front of the optical waveguides end faces.

Those parallel optical coupling scheme between optical waveguides and active optical elements has several disadvantages: has a large volume, the end faces of the optical waveguides have to be polished, produces a large electrical signal attenuation caused by a long electrical connection path between the photodetector and an electrical signal processing element, and a complexity of alignment process between the photodetector and the optical waveguide.

In a vertical or edge optical coupling scheme, the light propagation path of output light from optical waveguide of a PLC is changed vertically upwards or downwards of waveguide substrate and then photodetectors are directly attached on the surface of PLC. The above-described vertical optical coupling scheme can avoid the use of submount. In addition, automated or semi-automated surface mount assembly technique (SMT) using a high precision placement apparatus can be applied because the photodetectors can be directly attached on a PLC by die bonding or flip chip bonding process. Moreover, an electrical connection path between the photodetectors and signal processing devices can also be very short.

However, in order to implement the above described vertical optical coupling scheme, light path transforming apparatus which perpendicularly changes a light path with respect to a substrate is required inside the optical waveguide.

An optical coupling scheme between optical waveguides and photodetectors using the above-described light path transforming apparatus is disclosed in the U.S. Pat. No. 4,904,036 filed by AT&T Co. and Bell Laboratories. As a recent example, it is suggested in a paper titled “Photonic integrated circuits based on silica and polymer PLC” written by T. Izuhara, et al. and published in SPIE proceeding Vol. 8628 862807-1 (2013).

FIG. 1is a view illustrating a cross-sectional surface of an optical integrated circuit as prior art in which a light path turning mirror is embedded inside an optical waveguide and a photodetector is attached on the upper side of the light path turning mirror in order to describe a principle of vertical optical coupling scheme.

Referring toFIG. 1, an optical integrated circuit is provided with an optical waveguide consisted of a lower cladding layer21, a core layer22, and an upper cladding layer23, and a groove30formed crossing the optical waveguide perpendicularly on a substrate10.

Wherein, a sidewall31of the groove30crossing the optical waveguide through which light enters or exits is substantially perpendicular to a substrate, and an another sidewall32at the opposite side of the sidewall31is inclined about 45° with respect to the substrate10and is mirror-like polished for good light reflection.

In the above-described optical integrated circuit, light propagated through the core layer22substantially parallel to the substrate10exits to air from the sidewall31of the groove30. The light which exited the optical waveguide and propagated through the air, is reflected by an inclined mirror surface32, and turns its path upwardly and incidents into an active region of a photodetector50bonded by metal bonding pads40and solder bumps above the mirror surface32, as shown by a reference numeral35.

Wherein, when a light emitting VCSEL is applied instead of the photodetector50, the direction of the light path35is opposite thereto.

By the way, in the above-described structure, when the optical waveguide is made of polymer as disclosed in the U.S. Pat. No. 7,995,875 or made of silicon as disclosed in the US Patent Publication No. 2014/0205234, the above-described mirror surface32can be fabricated relatively easily inside the optical waveguide. However, when the optical waveguide material is silica, it is very difficult to fabricate the above-described mirror surface32inside the optical waveguide because silica is known as a material very difficult to machine using dry etching techniques.

Conventionally, an anisotropic dry etching technique generally used for the manufacturing of optical waveguide is also used for the fabrication of light path turning mirror. In general, anisotropic etching forms grooves having a vertical sidewall. In contrast to the conventional grooves that could be formed by normal anisotropic dry etching techniques, a groove for vertical coupling requires that the sidewall31through which light enters or exits to or from the waveguide has to substantially perpendicular to the substrate10and the mirror surface32facing the vertical sidewall31has to have about 45° slope with respect to the substrate10. Such a particular features of the groove (30) used for the exemplified applications (U.S. Pat. No. 7,995,875 and 2014/0205234) make difficult to implement such grooves by using the conventional anisotropic dry etching techniques and even more with a single processing step. In more detail, etching a groove having two different sidewall slopes as described above is very difficult. In despite of such difficulty, several methods of manufacturing the above-described light path turning mirror inside the optical waveguide have been disclosed. U.S. Pat. No. 8,236,481 disclosed by Google is one of the examples. However, most of the manufacturing methods proposed so far have several drawbacks; it requires very complex and high cost manufacturing processes such as electron-beam lithography, and in addition to that, the quality of the mirror surface and reproducibility of the slope angle are unsatisfactory.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a PLC based optical integrated circuit and a method of manufacturing the same by providing a groove trench which is capable of accommodating a micro-mirror inside an optical waveguide to perform a light coupling between the optical waveguide and an optical element which emits or receives light to or from the optical waveguide and inserting and fixing the micro-mirror separately manufactured from the PLC manufacturing process into the groove.

It is further an object of the present invention to provide an optical integrated circuit which reduces an optical power loss due to defects on a mirror surface by separately manufacturing the micro-mirror from optical integrated circuit manufacturing process and thereby providing a higher quality mirror surface, and a method of manufacturing the same.

In addition, the present invention is also related to an optical integrated circuit having a lower manufacturing cost by providing a light path turning micro-mirror made of various materials such as silicon, glass, and plastics, and a method of manufacturing the same.

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided an optical integrated circuit comprising an optical waveguide formed by sequentially stacking a lower cladding layer, a core layer, and an upper cladding layer configured to surround the core layer on a substrate; a groove trench (hereinafter, groove) formed by etching the upper cladding layer, the core layer and all or part of the lower cladding layer close to an end-face of the optical waveguide to intercept the light propagating through the core layer of the optical waveguide or conversely to incident light into the core layer; a plurality of bonding pads, separated apart from each other disposed on the periphery of the groove; a micro-mirror placed and cemented in the groove, and having a slanted mirror surface inclined in a range from 30 to 60° with respect to the bottom surface of the mirror to vertically reflect incident light from the core layer to the light receiving element residing on the groove or vice versa to vertically reflect incident light from a light source positioned on the upper portion of the groove into the core layer; and an active optical element bonded by the metallic bonding pads emits or receives light toward the micro-mirror or from the micro-mirror.

A first sidewall of the groove which faces the slanted surface of the micro-mirror may be formed to be tilted at an angle in the range of 6° to 15° with respect to a longitudinal axis of the core layer to prevent re-entry of reflected light at the waveguide-air interface.

The optical integrated circuit may further include a recess formed by etching a part of the upper cladding layer excluding an area in which the bonding pads are to be formed prior to the groove formation, and the groove is formed inside the recess.

According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of manufacturing an optical integrated circuit comprising steps of: 1) a substrate is provided, 2) forming optical waveguides by sequentially stacking a lower cladding layer, a core layer, and an upper cladding layer on a surface of the substrate; 3) forming grooves by etching the upper cladding layer, the core layer, and all or part of the lower cladding layer of the optical waveguides, and; 4) cementing a micro-mirror having a slanted mirror surface which reflects light horizontally exited from the core layer perpendicularly toward the upper side of the groove, or conversely which reflects light emitted from the upper side of the groove toward the surface of the groove and turns the light path horizontally to the substrate to couple into the core layer; and 5) bonding active optical elements, which detects light reflected from the mirror surface or otherwise emits light toward the mirror surface from the upper side of the groove, to the bonding pads formed on the upper cladding layer surface.

DESCRIPTION OF SPECIFIC EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION

Hereinafter, an optical integrated circuit and a method of manufacturing the same according to exemplary embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings. While the present invention is shown and described in connection with exemplary embodiments thereof, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications can be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.

FIG. 2is a cross-sectional view illustrating an optical integrated circuit according to a first embodiment of the present invention, andFIG. 3is a plan view illustrating the optical integrated circuit shown inFIG. 2. For reference, an active optical element is indicated with a dotted line inFIG. 3.

Referring toFIGS. 2 and 3, an optical integrated circuit100according to the present invention comprises a substrate110, an optical waveguide120, a groove125, a micro-mirror130, bonding pads140, and an active optical element150.

The optical waveguide120is formed by sequentially stacking a lower cladding layer121, a core layer122, and an upper cladding layer123on the substrate110.

The substrate110is made of silicon, silica glass, glass, or quartz.

The optical waveguide120guiding light through the core layer122is formed by polymer or silica glass, and composed of a lower cladding layer121coated on an entire surface of the substrate110, a core layer122formed on the predetermined region of the lower cladding layer121along the longitudinal direction of the substrate, and an upper cladding layer123covering the core layer122.

The lower cladding layer121, the core layer122and the upper cladding layer123are formed of silica glass, and the core layer122further comprise a dopant to adjust a refractive index.

The optical waveguide120disposed at the left side of the groove125or at the input terminal of the groove125may be extended along the surface parallel to the substrate110with a straight or curved shape.

In addition, a single optical waveguide120is exemplified at the input terminal of the groove125in the illustrated drawing; however the optical waveguide120may have branches along the substrate110.

For example, the optical waveguide120may have a single input terminal and a plurality of output terminals, that is a single input core layer is branched into two or more than two output core layers at an intermediate position between the input and output terminals.

Alternatively, the optical waveguide120may have a plurality of input terminals and a single output terminal, that is the plural number of input core layers are merged into one core layer at an intermediate position between the input and output terminals.

Alternatively, the optical waveguide120may be formed to have a plurality of input terminals and a plurality of output terminals.

The groove125is formed to cut the core layer122at a position close to an end section of the optical waveguide120.

The groove125is formed by etching the upper cladding layer123, the core layer122and all or part of the lower cladding layer121to intercept the light transmitted through the core layer122, or conversely, to couple a light into the core layer122.

The optical waveguide120truncated by the groove125, may emit light into the groove125or, conversely, the optical waveguide120may receive light from the groove125.

The groove125has no limitation to its shape as long as the groove125does not intrude the bonding pads140which will be described below.

A first sidewall126of the groove125through which light exits or enters to the truncated core layer122is formed substantially perpendicular the substrate.

In addition, the first sidewall126of the groove125which faces an inclined surface131of the micro-mirror130, which will be described below, and through which the light exits or enters the truncated core layer122is formed to be substantially perpendicular to the substrate110, and more preferably, is formed to have an angle “p” in a range of 80° to 110°.

It is preferable that other sidewalls as well as the first sidewall126forming the groove125are also substantially perpendicular to the substrate.

A bottom surface of the groove125is formed to be substantially flat, and to contact the lower cladding layer121of the optical waveguide120, or more preferably, to contact the surface of the substrate110.

The groove125is formed by patterning process using photolithography and anisotropic dry etching which are widely known in the art.

As illustrated inFIG. 3, a horizontal cross-section of the groove125is a polygonal shape. That is, a horizontal cross-section of the groove125may be a quadrilateral shape, or a trapezoidal shape or the like as illustrated inFIGS. 5 and 6.

The micro-mirror130is inserted into the groove125and cemented thereto. The micro-mirror130reflects a light which exits the core layer122into the groove125and turns its path vertically over the groove125, or conversely, reflects a light emitted downward from the upper side of the groove125and turns its path horizontally to couple the light into the core layer122.

That is, when the active optical element150disposed on the micro-mirror130is a VCSEL, the light emitted downward from the VCSEL is reflected by the micro-mirror130and the light path is turned in a direction substantially parallel to the substrate110, and the light is coupled into the core layer122of the optical waveguide120.

In addition, when a photodetector is used as the active optical element150disposed on the micro-mirror130, a light exits the core layer122into the groove125is reflected vertically by the micro-mirror130and enters into the active optical element150.

The micro-mirror130is cemented inside the groove125by using a thermal curing adhesive135.

The micro-mirror130may be also cemented by using a solder or metal alloys which have a melting point of at least above 300° C., instead of the adhesive135.

Wherein, the micro-mirror130is independent element manufactured separately from the optical waveguide and has at least one slanted side surface131.

An angle132of the slanted surface131of the micro-mirror130is in a range from 30° to 60° with respect to the bottom surface of the micro-mirror130.

Preferably, the inclination angle132of the slanted surface131of the micro-mirror130is 45° with respect to the bottom surface of the micro-mirror130.

It is preferable that the slanted surface131is coated with a metal to improve the reflection efficiency.

The micro-mirror130turns a light path which exits from the core layer122substantially parallel to the substrate110, to an upward direction which is substantially perpendicular to the substrate110.

The micro-mirror130has a height which does not interfere with the active optical element150disposed there above.

The micro-mirror130may be made of silicon, glass, polymer, etc.

When the micro-mirror130is made of a polymer, the micro-mirror130may be mass-produced at low cost by using a plastic molding technique.

When the micro-mirror130is made of <100> crystalline silicon, it is preferable that the inclined surface131be a (110) plane of the <100> crystalline silicon.

As illustrated, the micro-mirror130may have a single slanted surface131, or as illustrated inFIG. 4may have both side slanted surfaces.

The bonding pads140are formed on the surface of the optical waveguide that is, on the surface of upper cladding layer123along the groove125periphery as a plural number spaced apart from each other and composed of at least one metal layer141and a solder layer142.

The metal layers141have the same structure with a conventional under-bump metallization (UBM) used for flip-chip bonding or solder bonding and comprise: an adhesion layer141aconsisted of Ti or Cr as a lowest layer; a diffusion barrier layer141bconsisted of Ni, Pt, or TiW on the adhesion layer141a; and a passivation layer141cconsisted of gold on the diffusion barrier layer141b.

The metal layers141may also be formed to have a different structure from the illustrated example.

The solder layer142is formed on top of the metal layer141, and is a part in which the active optical element150is directly bonded thereon.

The active optical element150comprises bonding pads corresponding to the bonding pads140on the substrate110, and the active optical element150is bonded to the bonding pads140using a flip-chip bonding or a die bonding method. When a solder layer is provided on the bonding pads of the active optical element150, the solder layer142may be omitted.

A surface receiving type photodetector or a VCSEL may be used for the active optical element150.

An optical filter which transmits light having specific wavelength or wavelength band may be inserted at the front surface of the active optical element150.

Meanwhile, an inside of the groove125in which the micro-mirror130is mounted may be filled with a transparent polymer.

Here, the polymer filling the groove125may prevents micro-mirrors from environmental contamination and it is preferable to have the same or a similar refractive index as that of the core layer122.

Such an optical integrated circuit may also be formed to have a structure which comprises a plurality of optical waveguides, grooves formed close to the end sections of the optical waveguides, micro-mirrors embedded in the individual grooves, and active optical elements bonded above the individual micro-mirrors.

Alternatively, an optical integrated circuit may also be formed to have a structure comprises a plurality of optical waveguides, a single groove which crosses the plurality of optical waveguides, a single micro-mirror inserted in the groove, and a single array type active optical element bonded over the single micro-mirror.

In addition, an optical integrated circuit may be an optical demultiplexer, an optical multiplexer, or a coherent receiver.

Meanwhile, about 4% back-reflection occurs at the waveguide-air interface due to a refractive index difference between the silica and the air (about 1.46:1) when light exits from silica to air. Normally in order to prevent this adverse effect, an anti-reflection layer is coated on the end face of the optical waveguide. The optical anti-reflection layer is consisted of at least one thin film layer, and generally formed by using sputtering or evaporation method. In this process, it is important to precisely control the thickness of each layer.

By the way, it is very difficult to form uniform anti-reflection layers on the substantially perpendicular end face of the first sidewall126of the groove125by sputtering or evaporation method. As described above, when there is no anti-reflection layer on the end face of the optical waveguide, about 4% light reflection occurs at the waveguide-air interface, it is redirected into the waveguide, and then it can interfere with an input light signal.

An alternative way to solve such a back reflection problem due to the refractive index difference is tilting the end face of the optical waveguide with respect to a longitudinal axis of the optical waveguide so that the reflected light enters the core layer with an angle greater than a critical angle necessary for total internal reflection.

In the theory of optical waveguide, a critical angle needed for total internal reflection is determined by the refractive index of a core layer and a cladding layer and it can be easily conceived by those skilled in the art, therefore, detailed descriptions thereof will be omitted.

Generally, an end-face of the optical waveguide not considering the back reflection is perpendicular to both the substrate and a longitudinal axis of the optical waveguide or a propagation direction of light.

Therefore, there may be two different methods of tilting or rotating the end-face of the optical waveguide.

That is, 1) tilting the end-face of the optical waveguide at an angle less or greater than 90° with respect to a surface normal to the substrate110, and 2) rotating an end-face of the optical waveguide at an angle less or greater than 90° with respect to an axis normal to the longitudinal axis of the optical waveguide but keeps normal to the substrate110.

With reference toFIGS. 5 and 6, those two methods will be described in detail. Elements which perform the same functions as illustrated in the previous drawings will be marked by the same reference numerals. When a direction parallel to a longitudinal axis S of an optical waveguide120is referred to as a Z direction, a cross-section of the optical waveguide120can be denoted using a X axis parallel to a substrate110and a Y axis perpendicular to the substrate110. There are two methods rotating the first sidewall126of the groove125; that is, rotating around the X axis of the optical waveguide120and rotating around the Y axis of the optical waveguide120.

An etched cross-section of an optical waveguide120is substantially perpendicular to the substrate110as described in the related art due to a characteristic of anisotropic dry etching used for a groove125formation. So that it is much easier to manufacture a cross-section of a waveguide rotated around the Y axis of the optical waveguide120which is perpendicular to the substrate110between the two methods.

Accordingly, a groove125having a first sidewall126which is rotated a predetermined angle around the Y axis of the optical waveguide120is formed by dry etching the optical waveguide120.

Here, when a refractive index difference between the core layer122and two cladding layers121,123is about 3%, an appropriate rotation angle “a” of the first sidewall126around the Y axis or tilt angle “a” between the first sidewall126and the X axis is in a range of 6° to 15°. In another way referring toFIG. 6, the angle “a” may be expressed by an acute angle “b” between the longitudinal axis S of the optical waveguide120and the first sidewall126. In this case, the acute angle “b” is preferably in a range of 75° to 84°.

In the above description, the same effect may be obtained when the direction of the rotation of the first sidewall126around the Y axis as illustrated inFIG. 5is reversed and, therefore the acute angle “a” may be in a range of ±6° to ±15°.

When the first sidewall126is formed to have such an angle with respect to the Y axis of the optical waveguide120, a back reflected light at the first sidewall126—air interface re-enters into the core layer122with an incident angle greater than a critical angle needed for total internal reflection of the optical waveguide120, and then the back reflected light cannot propagate inside the core layer122and finally escapes to the cladding layer123.

That is, back reflected light “e” indicated with a dotted line inFIG. 6is restrained from transmission in the core layer122, and transmitted light “C” marked as a solid line propagates toward the micro-mirror130.

Meanwhile, during the cementing process of the micro-mirror130inside the groove125, a second sidewall127of the groove125facing the first sidewall126may be used for guiding a position and an angle of the micro-mirror130.

Referring toFIG. 6, the second sidewall127of the groove125facing the first sidewall126is formed normal to a central line “c” of the diffracted light at the first sidewall126and air interface. That is, an angle “d” between the central line “c” of the diffracted light and the second sidewall127is formed to be 90°. In this way, the micro-mirror130is automatically arranged so that the slanted surface131perpendicularly reflects the light which exited the core layer122by closely adhering and fixing the micro-mirror130to the second sidewall127.

Meanwhile, as illustrated inFIG. 7, an actual optical waveguide120may have a structure in which a central portion123awherein a core layer122is formed below is slightly higher than a peripheral portion123b. In more detail, during the process of forming a core layer122having a thickness of 4 μm to 6 μm on a lower cladding layer121, an unnecessary deposited core layer except an area constituting the core122is removed, and then an upper cladding layer123is formed thereon. Therefore the central portion123awhere the core layer122is formed below may become relatively higher than the periphery as much as the thickness of the core layer122.

In such a structure, in order to prevent an interference between an active optical element150and the upper cladding layer123above the core layer122, the bonding pads140formed on the peripheral portion123bof the core layer122have to be formed higher than the central portion123aof the upper cladding layer123over the core layer122. Increasing the height of the bonding pads140becomes a factor which not only makes a manufacturing process difficult but also raises manufacturing costs.

A structure to overcome such a problem is illustrated inFIGS. 8 and 9.

Referring toFIGS. 8 and 9, prior to form a groove125, forms a recess160by etching a part of an upper cladding layer123which faces an active optical element150to a depth equal to or greater than height deference between a central portion123aand a peripheral portion123bof the upper cladding layer123. Wherein, an effect of decreasing the height of the bonding pads140can be obtained by excluding a region in which bonding pads140are to be formed from the recess160area.

Wherein, a length L of the recess160is greater than the width of an active optical element150. And a width W of the recess is greater than a width of the central portion123aof the upper cladding layer123and less than the width of the active optical element150, or the width W of the recess can be greater than the width of the active optical element150.

The groove125is formed in the recess160using the same method described above.

Hereinafter, a manufacturing process of an optical integrated circuit will be described.

First, an optical waveguide120comprising a lower cladding layer121, a core layer122, and an upper cladding layer123on a surface of a substrate110is formed. Next, a recess160is formed by etching a part of the upper cladding layer123to a depth equal to or greater than the step height. Wherein, a region on which the bonding pads140is to be formed later is excluded from the recess area in which the active optical element150is to be disposed later in the recess area.

Here, by increasing a length L of the recess160greater than a width of the active optical element150in a direction parallel to the core layer122of the optical waveguide120, the active optical element150is prevented from directly touching the upper cladding layer123of the optical waveguide120. In addition, a width W of the recess160in a direction perpendicular to the core layer122of the optical waveguide120is greater than a width of the area where step height is exist, however, it is also plausible that the width W is less than a width of the optical element or greater than a width of the optical element.

Next, the groove125is formed by sequentially etching the upper cladding layer123, the core layer122, and all or part of the lower cladding layer121inside the recess160region.

Next, the bonding pads140are formed, and a micro-mirror130prepared separately is inserted into the groove125and cemented thereto.

Finally, an active optical element150is bonded by the bonding pads140on the upper cladding layer123over the groove125.

In the present invention as described above, a light path turning micro-mirror130is manufactured independently of a PLC manufacturing process and inserted into the vertically truncated optical waveguide120. Thus in this invention, the light path turning micro-mirror130can be made of various kind of materials and also the manufacturing cost of the optical integrated circuit100can be reduced.

In addition, the truncation angle of the optical waveguide can be properly adjusted and the cross-section of truncated optical waveguide can be rotated with respect to a light axis of the optical waveguide such that a back reflected light at the air-waveguide interface can be prevented from being transmitted through the optical waveguide.

Particularly, in the conventional art an optical waveguide itself is etched and the etched slanted side surface is used as a light path turning mirror to perform vertical light coupling between a planar optical waveguide and a surface illuminated type photodetector. Thus the manufacturing process of the mirror is very complex, requires very expensive processing equipment, the quality of the mirror surface is poor, and also there are many difficulties in controlling the angle of the mirror surface. However, in the present invention, the mirror is manufactured independently of a PLC manufacturing process so that the mirror can be more easily manufactured with various kinds of materials.

As described above, an optical integrated circuit and a method of manufacturing the same provides advantages; a PLC comprises simple groove trenches having vertical sidewall which are easily fabricated by conventional dry etching process, micro-mirrors are provided independently of the PLC fabrication process and the micro-mirrors are mounted into the grooves, and thus an optical integrated circuit manufacturing process is easier, a high-quality mirror surface can be provided, an optical loss by defective mirror surface can be reduced, micro-mirrors can be provided by various material, and thus, manufacturing costs can be reduced.