Polarization- and temperature-insensitive 8x400GHz O-band cascaded AWG for large radix data center and AI/ML networks

Palmer, Robert; Bulthuis, Henk; Antony, Cleitus; Zvěřina, Jakub; Beelen, Gunter; Sarkis, Jad; Bhatti, AbuBakar; Talli, Giuseppe; Kuschnerov, Maxim

Polarization- and temperature-insensitive 8x400GHz O-band cascaded AWG for large radix data center and AI/ML networks

Files

ADOPTION_AWG_JLT_v17.pdf(1.6 MB)

Date

2025

Authors

Palmer, Robert

Bulthuis, Henk

Antony, Cleitus

Zvěřina, Jakub

Beelen, Gunter

Sarkis, Jad

Bhatti, AbuBakar

Talli, Giuseppe

Kuschnerov, Maxim

Publisher

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

Abstract

We demonstrate a PLC-based O-Band 8-channel cascaded AWG design. The manufactured prototypes achieve 400 GHz channel spacing while simultaneously reaching a 1 dB bandwidth of 300 GHz and a crosstalk below -40 dB. The measured fiber-to-fiber loss is as low as 2.7 dB and the PDL is below 0.2 dB. We determine a low thermal drift of -1.8 GHz/Kelvin. The combination of low IL, high bandwidth, low crosstalk, and low thermal drift make the device particularly attractive for WDM-based data center and AI networks architectures that benefit from a large network switch radix.

Keywords

AWG , Demultiplexing , Integrated optics , Multiplexing , PLC

Citation

Palmer, R., Bulthuis, H., Antony, C., Zvěřina, J., Beelen, G., Sarkis, J., Bhatti, A., Talli, G. and Kuschnerov, M. (2025) 'Polarization- and temperature-insensitive 8x400GHz O-band cascaded AWG for large radix data center and AI/ML networks' [forthcoming], IEEE/OSA Journal of Lightwave Technology.