Optical MZI Correction Based on Normalization of Parasitic Oscillations

Student’s name: Samdrea Hsu Home Institution: San Diego Miramar College NNCI Site: SDNI @ UC San Diego REU Principal Investigator: Dr. Shaya Fainman – Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering REU Mentor: Andrew Grieco – Chip-Scale Photonics Testing Facility at UC San Diego Abstract: In optical telecommunication systems, modulators are crucial in encoding information onto light waves to be transmitted. One such modulator is the Mach-Zehnder Interferometer (MZI), which uses the interference phenomena of light waves to modulate light. However, in experiments, MZI modulation often shows spurious transmission artifacts due to reflections in the system. These parasitic oscillations prevent precise modulation by introducing unwanted measurement. To correct these artifacts, specifically those concerning the transmission amplitude, we propose an algorithm based on a pre-computed normalization factor. With this correction algorithm, we aim to enhance the reliability and accuracy of MZI modulators, to be used in communication systems requiring precise optical signal manipulation.