Laser Assisted Cleaving for Waveguide Facets on Silicon

Abstract

We have developed a method for facet cleaving of silicon substrates which is applicable to integrated waveguides. The method relies on a femtosecond laser-cut trench on the opposite side of the substrate to the waveguides. Resulting facets produce waveguides with higher optical throughput than those produced with only mechanical cleaving, even when laser cut trenches have minor angle misalignment with the silicon crystal plane.