Ultrafast Laser Plasma Implantation- Seamless Integration of Functional Materials for Advanced Photonics

SeaMatics is an "advanced materials manufacturing project for photonic integrated circuits" for a range of emerging applications in optical communication, sensors, imaging technology for healthcare, and lighting. Unlike the integration in electronic circuits in which electrons flow seamlessly, in photonic integrated circuits at the light does not flow seamlessly due to mismatch of refractive index and materials dissimilarity. In order to facilitate a way forward for fabricating light circuits, the SeaMatics team has embarked on research which will exploit a novel "ultrafast laser plasma implantation (ULPI)" based technique for fabricating complex structures, using following materials: rare-earth ion doped glass, polymers and silicon and GaAs semiconductors. Such a combinatorial approach for materials fabrication will yield photonic circuit for engineering range energy-efficient devices for cross-sectorial applications (health, manufacturing, energy, digital).
The project is led by the University of Leeds and is supported by has four academic partners by the Universities of Cambridge, Sheffield and York in the respective areas of research on polymeric devices, III-V semiconductors, and silicon photonics. The EPSRC National Centre for III-V Technologies will be accessed for materials and device fabrication.
Eleven industry partners directly involved in the project are: DSTL, GTS/British Glass, Glucosense/NetScientific, Product Evolution, PVD Products, CST, IQE, Dow Corning, Xyratex, Gooch and Housego and Semtech. The industry links covers from materials manufacturing to optical components and their applications in optical/data communication, sensors for healthcare, energy for lighting. In this partnership the manufacturing is linked with different levels of supply chain, which we aim to demonstrate by researching on exemplar devices as end points.

The main goals of the project are

a) Set up a ULPI manufacturing capability at Leeds which will serve the needs of academic and industrial communities in UK to start with and then expand for international collaboration.

b) Our first application led manufacturing example will demonstrate ULPI based RE-earth doped glass photonic circuits with light splitting, lasing and amplification functions on a chip.

c) In another example we will demonstrate electrically pumped semiconductor lasers (VCSEL and VECSEL) and integrated with rare-earth ion doped glass for broadband and tunable lasers.

d) Approaches developed in b) and c) will be then expanded for manufacturing larger scale photonic integrated circuits on silicon, embodying multiple functions using the techniques developed in a).

e) ULPI as technique will be applied for engineering novel range of polymer-glass sensor devices which will be used for health care.

f) The final goal of project is to provide training, dissemination, and outreach opportunities for new researchers in SeaMatics. Dissemination related activities will be via the standard peer-review publications in prestigious journals, conferences and workshops. Dedicated symposia are planned for dissemination, and also the outreach activities involving UG/PG interns, PhD students and Sixth form pupils.

SeaMatics offers a new technology horizon for manufacturing, which has attracted a wide ranging interest from industry, explained in the Pathways to Impact. We have also explained direct economic, societal, knowledge and people impacts. Besides the direct benefits derived from SeaMatics, others are also explained in the pathways to impact.

EMERGING OPPORTUNITIES: Although the advanced photonic and optoelectronic materials is the mainstay of the project, there has been a number of emerging important side lines of applications which will also dominate in future. For example, the strengthening and toughening of glass is a major challenge in large architectural buildings such as the Apple Buildings in major cities, Chard in London which are emerging globally at a fantastic rate. In such buildings multifunctionality of glass surface from self-cleaning to energy harvesting, robustness and durability over long period will be required. Such complex functions are impossible to achieve via hot forming of very large sections of glass, which consume huge amount of energy for each type of surface modification. ULPI will be a desirable disruptive technology.

Manufacturing architectural glass with multi-functional surface will stimulate new research and development via the participation of architects and landscape artists, civil and materials engineers, and laser manufactures of glass sheets for their toughened laser welding. On a smaller scale of glass strengthening and toughening applications, there is also opportunity for container glass industry where together with toughened wall, the product identification with infrangible and product quality control for food and pharmaceutical companies is also a potential opportunity.
The above approach for toughening is also applicable for display and car windscreens.
In order to capture the emerging strength and toughening market, there is a new line of technology exploitation which is being pursued by the PI with the support from GTS in Sheffield. The new opportunity, called the Optimus, is an exploitation vehicle which will be integrated with the SeaMatics to create a TSB project in future. Besides this, a strong portfolio of glass manufacturing related patents at UoL which are licensed to GTS has opened an opportunity for setting up of a TSB funded AMSCE project. This is being actively pursued by GTS for the completion of proposal (£12 million) for submission in October 2014, in which UoL is one of the knowledge stakeholders.

NEW FACILITIES FOR KNOWLEDGE: The application of ULPI for dielectric and semiconductor materials is in its infantile state of knowledge and in this respect, the potential for a new facility at Leeds will create an epicentre from where new knowledge in Physics, Materials Science and Device Engineering will spread in the rest of world via people training, international research partnership (e.g. Politecnico di Milano, Kyoto University in Japan, ANU in Australia) which we will be able to leverage with the EU funding in H2020.