Bragg gratings in imprinted Ormocer waveguides

Volume-type Bragg gratings have been fabricated within planar rib-type waveguides based on the inorganic- organic hybrid polymer OrmoComp®. The waveguides have been achieved using the innovative UV enhanced substrate conformal imprint lithography, which allows for a large area patterning at high throughput. For the inscription of volume-type Bragg gratings, the static phase-mask technique was applied with a KrF excimer laser as light source. By applying this technique, well defined Bragg gratings have been achieved within pre-cured OrmoComp® featuring a high reflectivity of up to 80 % and a small full width at half maximum of down to 130 pm. The fabricated volume-type Bragg grating was furthermore applied in the field of temperature sensing, where a high sensitivity of -130 pm/°C was found, which corresponds to a limit of detection of only 4.6 10-2 °C.