Thin film type two dimensional optical deflector

Abstract

Abstract PURPOSE:To obtain a deflector for two-dimensional scanners by using the same small-sized thin film type deflector by deflecting the guided light which is propagated in a thin film optical waveguide in parallel directions then heating the waveguide with a heating element thereby deflecting the light further in a vertical direction. CONSTITUTION:A thin film optical waveguide 12 thermally diffused with Ti is formed on a single crystal piezoelectric substrate 11 of LiNbO3, etc. A comb type electrode IDT14 and a grating coupler 13 for introducing incident light into the waveguide 12 are formed in one side part on the surface the waveguide 12 and a heating element 15 vapor deposited with Ni-Cr is formed on the surface of the exit end part 12a of the waveguide 12. The guided light 16 made incident to the coupler 13 is deflected in parallel direction by the surface acoustic wave SAW19 generated by the high frequency voltage 18 applied to the IDT14 to guided light 20. This light passes through an imaginary prism 21 formed by heating the element 15, by which the refractive index of the light is changed to (a), (b), (c), and the light 20 is polarized secondarily in the vertical direction of a light exit angle theta, whereby the two-dimensional deflector is obtained.

Inventors

• 👤 Naohisa Inoue
• 👤 直久 井上
• 👤 Kazuhiko Mori
• 👤 和彦 森
• 👤 Masaharu Matano
• 👤 俣野　正治
• 👤 Maki Yamashita
• 👤 山下　牧

Bibliographic Details