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In-line evanescent-field-coupled THz bandpass mux/demux fabricated by additive layer manufacturing technology

A. I. Hernandez-Serrano, Simon J. Leigh, and Emma Pickwell-MacPherson

Open Access Open Access

Abstract

In this research, we present the design, fabrication, and experimental validation of 3D printed bandpass filters and mux/demux elements for terahertz frequencies. The filters consist of a set of in-line polystyrene (PS) rectangular waveguides, separated by 100 µm, 200 µm, and 400 µm air gaps. The principle of operation for the proposed filters resides in coupled-mode theory. Q-factors of up to 3.4 are observed, and additionally, the experimental evidence demonstrates that the Q-factor of the filters can be improved by adding fiber elements to the design. Finally, using two independent THz broadband channels, we demonstrate the first mux/demux device based on 3D printed in-line filters for the THz range. This approach represents a fast, robust, and low-cost solution for the next generation of THz devices for communications.

Published by The Optical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

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Data Availability

The data presented in this paper are available at http://figshare.com/articles/data_dielectric_mux_zip/12115308.

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Figures (8)
Fig. 1.
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the 3D printed in line bandpass filter. Photo (right) of four filters with different numbers of fibers for a 400 µm spacing. A single fiber element is also shown.

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Fig. 2.
Fig. 2. (a) Coupling length surface as function of frequency and spacing between fibers. The horizontal plane represents the 25 mm overlapping distance (${L_o}$). (b) Top view of (a) without the horizontal plane.

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Fig. 3.
Fig. 3. Electric field intensity simulations for the 200 µm spaced filter and four dielectric fibers at (a) 110 GHz, (b) 160 GHz and (c) 200 GHz. The E-field travels from left to the right of the simulation window.

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Fig. 4.
Fig. 4. (a) Schematic diagram of the experimental setup. The THz probes were arranged in a transmission configuration. THz light is guided using four TPX lenses (1.5-inch diameter) with 50 mm focal length. Metallic apertures were used to hold the filter in position and to prevent direct transmission of THz radiation from the emitter (Tx) to the receiver (Rx). (b) Photograph of the experimental apparatus.

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Fig. 5.
Fig. 5. Transmission spectra of filters with (a) five fibers, (b) transmission spectra of the filters with two, three, four and five fibers keeping the spacing between fibers constant (a=200$\mu m$). The transmission was calculated by taking the ratio between the transmitted light through every individual filter and the transmitted radiation through a single rectangular fiber element with the same length of the filter.

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Fig. 6.
Fig. 6. (a) Transmitted THz light relative to the free-space transmission for the 100 µm, 200 µm, 400 µm spaced five fibers filter and single fiber case. (b) Experimental Q-factor as a function of the number of fibers. The straight lines in (a) are linear fits to the experimental Q-factor.

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Fig. 7.
Fig. 7. Experimental transmission spectra, compared to the air-reference, for the two filter devices acting as a: (a) demultiplexer and (b) multiplexer. The inset represents the schematic diagram of the mux/demux device as well as the experimental configuration. The spacing between fibers was 100 µm and 400 µm.

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Fig. 8.
Fig. 8. (a) Normalized transmission spectra for the two independent broadband THz input channels experiment. Inset shows a photograph of the finished device. (b) Photograph of the experimental configuration.

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Equations (3)

Equations on this page are rendered with MathJax. Learn more.

− γ n a i r 2 t a n h t a n h ( 0.5 γ a ) + K 1 n P S 2 t a n t a n ( K 1 d ) − γ n a i r 2 [ 1 + γ K 1 ( n P S n a i r ) 2 t a n h t a n h ( γ a ) t a n t a n ( γ d ) ] = 0
1 − K 1 γ ( n a i r n P S ) t a n h t a n h ( 0.5 γ a ) t a n t a n ( K 1 d ) + γ K 1 ( n P S n a i r ) t a n t a n ( K 1 d ) + ( n P S n a i r ) 2 t a n h t a n h ( 0.5 γ a ) = 0 ,
L c = π β e v e n − β o d d .
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