Patent ID: 7912327

Claim:
An electro-optic (EO) polymer/sol-gel modulator, comprising: a sol-gel under cladding having a refractive index n 1 ; a sol-gel core having a refractive index n 2 >n 1 ; a sol-gel side cladding having a refractive index n 3 <n 2 in the same plane as the sol-gel core; an EO polymer layer having a graded refractive index, said layer having an index n 4 <n 2 in a first passive region that provides a top cladding for the sol-gel core to define a first sol-gel waveguide in said first passive region, said index graded in a first transition region from n 4 up to n 5 >n 2 in an active region so that the sol-gel core provides a bottom cladding for the EO polymer layer to define an EO polymer waveguide in the active region, and said index graded in a second transition region from n 5 down to n 6 <n 2 in a second passive region that provides a top cladding for the sol-gel core to define a second sol-gel waveguide in the second passive region, said EO polymer layer poled along a direction; a sol-gel buffer layer above the EO polymer layer, said buffer layer having a refractive index n 7 <n 5 in the active region; and first and second electrodes on opposite sides of the EO polymer waveguide in the active region, said electrodes configured to receive a voltage signal to apply an electric field along the poling direction to change the refractive index of the EO polymer waveguide in the active region.