Abstract

The monolithic integration of vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) with active electronic devices combines the optical source array and its driver circuits into a single IC technology, which is usefill for parallel high-speed optical interconnects. Another motive for the integration of VCSELs with high speed electronics is to provide an optical switching network with a simple optoelectronic interface that allows individual electronic computer processors to communicate with each other through parallel optical channels. A dynamically reconfigurable optical switching network^1-2 can simultaneously route optical data between many different electronic processors as they perform parallel processing sequences using shared resources. Each switch of the network must provide an optical link to all the other nodes, as well as an optical ⟺ electrical interface to an electronic processor. Each switch must thus perform both the optical and optoelectronic switching functions in order to convert data between various combinations of electrical and optical input/output (I/O) formats.

© 1995 Optical Society of America