Recent Progress in Silicon‐Based Photonic Integrated Circuits and Emerging Applications

Abstract

AbstractIn recent years, with the further ministration of the semiconductor device in integrated circuits, power consumption and data transmission bandwidth have become insurmountable obstacles. As an integrated technology, photonic integrated circuits (PICs) have a promising potential in the post‐Moore era with more advantages in data processing, communication, and diversified sensing applications for their ultra‐high process speed and low power consumption. Silicon photonics is believed to be an encouraging solution to realize PICs because of the mature CMOS process. The past decades have witnessed a huge growth in silicon PICs. However, there is still a demand for the development of silicon PICs to enable powerful chip‐scale systems and new functionalities. In this paper, a review of the photonic components, functional blocks, and emerging applications for PICs is offered. The common photonic components are classified into several sections, including on‐chip light sources, fiber‐to‐chip couplers, photonic resonators, waveguide‐based sensors, on‐chip photodetectors, and modulators. The functional blocks of the PICs mentioned in this review are photonic memories and photonic neural networks. Finally, the paper concludes with emerging applications for further study.