RECONFIGURABLE BINARY OPTICAL ROUTING SWITCHES WITH FAN-OUT BASED ON THE INTEGRATION OF GAAS/ALGAAS SURFACE-EMITTING LASERS AND HETEROJUNCTION PHOTOTRANSISTORS

The design, fabrication, and experimental demonstration of dynamically reconfigurable binary optical switches based on the integration of GaAs/AlGaAs vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers and heterojunction phototransistors are reported. These new monolithic optical switches can perform spatial routing and optical amplification functions on input optical data with a fan-out of two, and can be programmed using simple voltage control. The 1 x 2 and 2 x 2 devices provide the basis for a high performance, two-dimensional optical switching fabric with electrical interfaces for optical switching and interconnection networks.