Highly Reliable, Cost-effective and Temperature-stable Top-illuminated Avalanche Photodiode (APD) for 100G Inter-Datacenter ER4-Lite Applications

Abstract

One of the key enablers for 100G ER4-Lite optical modules is 25G APD photodetector that can be employed in 30-40km optical links for inter-datacenter applications. In this paper, we demonstrate that a cost-effective top-illuminated InGaAs/InAlAs APD photodetector can be manufactured to meet stringent IEEE standard of 100G ER4-Lite. The 25G APD shows high bandwidth, high sensitivity with superb temperature stability of breakdown voltage. The APD photodetector also possesses excellent durability against harsh optical and electrical overload in both burst and continuous modes. Robust reliability performance based on aging conditions of 85-175C has also been achieved with an activation energy of 1.18eV.