Design, analysis and implementation of free-space optical interconnects

Optical interconnects represent an attractive alternative technology for the implementation of dense, high-speed interconnects, as they do not suffer from many of the problems plaguing electrical interconnects such as frequency-dependent crosstalk and attenuation.; However, optics has still not been accepted commercially as an interconnect technology. There is concern regarding the cost and complexity of the optomechanics needed to achieve the very fine alignments necessary to guarantee that the light emitted from the source actually falls on the receiver. The demonstration of a simple-to-assemble, dense and robust optical interconnect would constitute an important proof of the practicality of this technology. The photonic backplane demonstrator system presented in this thesis addresses these issues through a novel approach; the system uses slow Gaussian beams (f/16) and a clustered design to maximize misalignment tolerances. This in turn relaxes the positioning and packaging requirements for the components, thus simplifying assembly.; This thesis pursues two sets of complementary goals; the first set is concerned with the demonstration of some desirable optomechanical characteristics for optical interconnects such as passive alignment, repeatability and stability while the second set of goals is concerned with a verification of hypotheses often used in the design and implementation of optical interconnects. Such hypotheses are often used in practice to design optical interconnects despite the fact that little data exists in the literature to warrant their use. It therefore makes good sense to spend some time verifying the accuracy of these models. This will provide a solid engineering foundation for the design of future systems.