Patent ID: 6928215

Claim:
An adiabatic optical tap, comprising: a source waveguide for carrying an input signal; a first tap waveguide positioned a first distance from the source waveguide in a coupling region; and, a second tap waveguide, a portion positioned a second distance from the first tap waveguide in the coupling region, the first distance is either greater than the second distance in the coupling region or the first distance is less than the second distance in the coupling region; wherein the first tap waveguide is optically coupled to the source waveguide in the coupling region, the second tap waveguide is optically coupled to the first tap waveguide, the portion of the second tap waveguide in the coupling region having a length of about 1 micron or more and about 30000 microns or less, the second tap waveguide forming an output signal based at least in part upon the input signal, the first distance, the second distance, and the length of the second tap waveguide in the coupling region are selected so that power loss is about 0.5% or less.