Metasurface Deflector Enhanced Grating Coupler for Perfectly Vertical Coupling

Abstract

We propose a perfectly vertical coupling scheme based on metasurface deflectors (meta-deflectors) and grating couplers (GCs). An approach for optimizing the GCs based on the Gaussian-fitting using the genetic algorithm is proposed. An meta-deflector based on amorphous silicon (a-Si) pillars is designed to the optimal coupling angle of the GC to ensure good coupling efficiency (CE). Simulations predict peak vertical CE to be 78% at the wavelength of 2 μm, with 1 dB bandwidth ≥35 nm. The design process of GC and meta-deflector is provided in detail, and the influence of fabrication error on the CE is analyzed.

Keywords

• grating coupler
• perfectly vertical coupler
• metasurface deflector