Hybrid-integrated polarization diverse coherent receiver based on polymer PLC

A dual-polarization coherent receiver using polymer planar lightwave circuit technology is demonstrated for the first time. It comprises optical 90 hybrids on the basis of polymer waveguides, polarization beam-splitting thin-film elements, and photodetectors made of InGaAsP/InP. The chip size fits into the existing receiver package standards. The receiver assembly shows a high polarization extinction ratio (>25 dB over C-band) and is successfully operated in system experiments with 16-quadrature-amplitude modulation and quadrature phase-shift keying modulation up to 112 Gb/s.