10 Gb/s 5 Vpp AND 5.6 Vpp drivers implemented together with a monolithically integrated silicon modulator in 0.25 μm SiGe:C BiCMOS.

Two modulator drivers in 0.25 μm SiGe:C BiCMOS, which are integrated each together with a Mach–Zehnder modulator for electro-optical modulation (optical C-band) are presented. The fully integrated modulator occupies an area of 12.3 mm 2 . Carrier depletion in reverse biased pn junctions is used to adjust the refractive index in both arms of the Mach–Zehnder modulator (dual-drive configuration). The first integrated driver has a low power consumption of 0.68 W but a high gain of S 21 =37 dB and delivers an inverted as well as a non-inverted output data signal between 0 V and 2.5 V (5 V pp differential). The driver circuit is supplied with 2.5 V and at the output stage with 3.5 V. Bit-error-ratio (BER) measurements with a pseudo-random-bit-sequence (PRBS 2 31 −1) resulted in a BER better than 10 −12 for input voltage differences down to 50 mV pp . A second adapted driver is supplied with 2.5 V and 4.2 V, consumes 0.87 W and delivers a differential data signal with 5.6 V pp having a gain of S 21 =40 dB. The fully integrated modulator achieved at an optical wavelength of 1540 nm and 10 Gb/s data rate an extinction ratio of 3.3 dB for a 1 mm long modulator ( V π L π ≈2 V cm) with driver variant 1 and 8.4 dB for a 2 mm long modulator with driver variant 2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]