Fast optical phased array with ultra-lightweight high-contrast-grating mirrors

Abstract

We report an optical phased array (OPA) using high-contrast-grating (HCG) as an electrostatically actuated mirror for the purpose of free space fast beamsteering. In this paper, several attractive properties of HCG mirror are introduced such as single material, high reflectance along a wide bandwidth and low-mass inertia and the fabrication result is shown. ±10° × 10° with 2° beam width is observed at 1550 nm wavelength using HCG optical phased array.