Patent ID: 7693355

Claim:
An electro-optic (EO) polymer/sol-gel modulator, comprising: a substrate; an insulating layer; a sol-gel under cladding having a refractive index n 1 ; a sol-gel core having a refractive index n 2 >n 1 confined below and on either side by said under cladding, said core having a vertical taper that exposes the surface of said under cladding in an active region; an EO polymer waveguide that covers the vertical taper in the sol-gel core and the exposed surface of the sol-gel under cladding, said EO polymer waveguide having a refractive index n 3 >n 2 in the active region that decreases along the vertical taper to a refractive index n 4 ≈n 2 , said EO polymer waveguide poled along a direction; a buffer layer having a refractive index n 5 <n 2 over the EO polymer waveguide within the vertical taper; 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.