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The human brain has immense learning capabilities at extreme energy efficiencies and scale that no artificial system has been able to match. For decades, reverse engineering the brain has been one of the top priorities of science and technology research. Despite numerous efforts, conventional electronics-based methods have failed to match the scalability, energy efficiency, and self-supervised learning capabilities of the human brain. On the other hand, very recent progress in the development of new generations of photonic and electronic memristive materials, device technologies, and 3D electronic-photonic integrated circuits (3D EPIC ) promise to realize new brain-derived neuromorphic systems with comparable connectivity, density, energy-efficiency, and scalability. When combined with bio-realistic learning algorithms and architectures, it may be possible to realize an 'artificial brain' prototype with general self-learning capabilities. This paper argues the possibility of reverse-engineering the brain through architecting a prototype of a brain-derived neuromorphic computing system consisting of artificial electronic, ionic, photonic materials, devices, and circuits with dynamicity resembling the bio-plausible molecular, neuro/synaptic, neuro-circuit, and multi-structural hierarchical macro-circuits of the brain based on well-tested computational models. We further argue the importance of bio-plausible local learning algorithms applicable to the neuromorphic computing system that capture the flexible and adaptive unsupervised and self-supervised learning mechanisms central to human intelligence. Most importantly, we emphasize that the unique capabilities in brain-derived neuromorphic computing prototype systems will enable us to understand links between specific neuronal and network-level properties with system-level functioning and behavior., Comment: 15 pages, 12 figures

As silicon photonics transitions from research to commercial deployment, packaging solutions that efficiently couple light into highly-compact and functional sub-micron silicon waveguides are imperative but remain challenging. The 220 nm silicon-on-insulator (SOI) platform, poised to enable large-scale integration, is the most widely adopted by foundries, resulting in established fabrication processes and extensive photonic component libraries. The development of a highly-efficient, scalable and broadband coupling scheme for this platform is therefore of paramount importance. Leveraging two-photon polymerization (TPP) and a deterministic free-form micro-optics design methodology based on the Fermat's principle, this work demonstrates an ultra-efficient and broadband 3-D coupler interface between standard SMF-28 single-mode fibers and silicon waveguides on the 220 nm SOI platform. The coupler achieves a low coupling loss of 0.8 dB for fundamental TE mode, along with 1-dB bandwidth exceeding 180 nm. The broadband operation enables diverse bandwidth-driven applications ranging from communications to spectroscopy. Furthermore, the 3-D free-form coupler also enables large tolerance to fiber misalignments and manufacturing variability, thereby relaxing packaging requirements towards cost reduction capitalizing on standard electronic packaging process flows.

The co-packaging of optics and electronics provides a potential path forward to achieving beyond 50 Tbps top of rack switch packages. In a co-packaged design, the scaling of bandwidth, cost, and energy is governed by the number of optical transceivers (TxRx) per package as opposed to transistor shrink. Due to the large footprint of optical components relative to their electronic counterparts, the vertical stacking of optical TxRx chips in a co-packaged optics design will become a necessity. As a result, development of efficient, dense, and wide alignment tolerance chip-to-chip optical couplers will be an enabling technology for continued TxRx scaling. In this paper, we propose a novel scheme to vertically couple into standard 220 nm silicon on insulator waveguides from 220 nm silicon nitride on glass waveguides using overlapping, inverse double tapers. Simulation results using Lumerical's 3D Finite Difference Time Domain solver solver are presented, demonstrating insertion losses below -0.13 dB for an inter-chip spacing of 1 $\mu$m, 1 dB vertical and lateral alignment tolerances of approximately $\pm$ 2.7 $\mu$m, a greater than 300 nm 1 dB bandwidth, and 1 dB twist and tilt tolerance of approximately 2.3 degrees and 0.4 degrees, respectively. These results demonstrate the potential of our coupler for use in co-packaged designs requiring high performance, high density, CMOS compatible out of plane optical connections., Comment: 14 pages, 7 figures, 3 tables, US patent no. 11067754

Globally, the long-haul transmission of ultra-high bandwidth data is enabled through coherent communications. Driven by the rapid pace of growth in interconnectivity over the last decade, long-haul data transmission has reached capacities on the order of tens to hundreds of terabits per second, over fiber reaches which may span thousands of kilometers. Data center communications however operate in a different regime, featuring shorter reaches and characterized as being more cost and power sensitive. While integrated microresonator frequency combs are poised to revolutionize light sources used for high-speed data transmission over fiber, their use has been limited to coherent detection schemes. In this paper, we demonstrate the use of microresonator frequency combs pumped with a single laser for the transmission of high-speed data, importantly using direct detection schemes. We achieve 120 Gb/s and 240 Gb/s aggregate data transmission for 30 Gb/s non-return-to-zero (NRZ) and 60 Gb/s pulse modulation amplitude 4 (PAM4) modulation formats respectively over 2 km of optical fiber, exceeding the reach, single lane data rate, and aggregate data rates specified in Parallel Single Mode 4 (PSM4) and Course Wavelength Division Multiplex 4 (CWDM4) multi-source agreements. Remarkably, we achieve an extremely low power penalty of 0.1 dB compared to back-to-back characterization. The results firmly cement CMOS-compatible micro-resonator frequency combs based high-speed data transmission as a viable technology for the cost and power sensitive data center transceiver industry.

While the pathophysiology underlying the COVID-19 infection remains incompletely understood, there is growing evidence to indicate that it is closely correlated to hypercoagulation among severely ill patients. Doctors may choose for use anti-coagulation doses to treat the patients at intensive care units. A rapid, easy, and low-cost solution to monitor the coagulation status at the point-of-care may help with treatment by enabling the administration of controlled doses of medication to patients and to understand the disease's underlying pathophysiology. Thromboelastography, the clinical standard is accurate; it suffers from limited portability and low sensitivity when miniaturized to handheld form factor. In the article, we summarize research helping to advance towards an integrated optofluidic device combining microfluidics and photonic sensor technology. Microfluidics are used to perform blood pre-processing, and a photonic sensor measures blood coagulation status in real-time readout on the device itself. These techniques make it portable and scalable, potentially serving as technology foundation for the development of a disposable sensor for point-of-care diagnostics in COVID-19 patients and coagulopathy in general., Comment: point-of-care diagnostics. COVID-19 treatment, blood coagulometry, microfluidics, photonic sensors, silicon photonics, coagulopathy

We propose an on-chip mid-infrared (MIR) photonic spectroscopy platform for aerosol characterization to obtain highly discriminatory information on the chemistry of aerosol particles. Sensing of aerosols is crucial for various environmental, climactic, warfare threat detection, and pulmonary healthcare applications. Further, there are a number of unintended situations for potential exposure to bioaerosols such as viruses, bacteria, and fungi. For instance, the current pandemic scenario of COVID-19 occurring across the world. Currently, chemical characterization of aerosols is performed using FTIR spectroscopy yielding chemical fingerprinting because most of the vibrational and rotational transitions of chemical molecules fall in the MIR range; and Raman spectroscopy. Both techniques use free space bench-top geometries. Here, we propose miniaturized on-chip MIR photonics-based aerosol spectroscopy consisting of a broadband spiral-waveguide sensor that significantly enhances particle-light interaction to improve sensitivity. The spiral waveguides are made of a chalcogenide glass material (Ge23Sb7S70) which shows a broad transparency over IR range. We demonstrate the sensing of N-methyl aniline-based aerosol particles with the device. We anticipate that the sensor will readily complement existing photonic resonator-based particle sizing and counting techniques to develop a unified framework for on-chip integrated photonic aerosol spectroscopy., Comment: Updated title, references, introduction and motivation; no change in results. MIR Aerosol sensing, Bio-aerosol detection, COVID-19 equivalent virus detection, On-chip spectroscopy, Mid IR photonics

We demonstrate the chemical characterization of aerosol particles with on-chip spectroscopy using a photonic cavity enhanced silicon nitride (Si3N4) racetrack resonator-based sensor. The sensor operates over a broad and continuous wavelength range, showing cavity enhanced sensitivity at specific resonant wavelengths. Analysis of the relative change in the quality factor of the cavity resonances successfully yields the absorption spectrum of the aerosol particles deposited on the resonators. Detection of N-methyl aniline-based aerosol detection in the Near InfraRed (NIR) range of 1500 nm to 1600 nm is demonstrated. Our aerosol sensor spectral data compares favorably with that from a commercial spectrometer, indicating good accuracy. The small size of the device is advantageous in remote, environmental, medical and body-wearable sensing applications., Comment: photonics, aerosol sensing, optics, chem-biosensing, cavity enhanced sensing

We show that the ultrashort cavity soliton in octave-spanning Kerr frequency comb generation exhibits striking self-adaptiveness and robustness to external perturbations, resulting in a novel frequency shifting/cancellation mechanism and gigantic dispersive wave generation in response to the strong frequency dependence of Kerr nonlinearity, Raman scattering, chromatic dispersion, and cavity Q. These observations open up a great avenue towards versatile manipulation of nonlinear soliton dynamics, flexible spectrum engineering of mode-locked Kerr frequency combs, and highly efficient frequency translation of optical waves.

In this paper we report phase modulation obtained by inducing a capacitive charge on graphene layers embedded in the core of a waveguide. There is a biasing regime in which graphene absorption is negligible but large index variations can be achieved with a voltage-length product as small as $V_\pi\,L_\pi \simeq 0.04 $\,V\,cm . Examples of phase induced changes are computed for straight waveguides and for microring resonators showing the possibility to implement several optoelectronic functionalities as modulators, tunable filters, and switches., Comment: Review needed due to an error in an expression