Angle Selective Enhancement of Beam Deflection in High-Speed Electrooptic Switches

Fast electrooptic (EO) deflector switches (DSs) have high potential for applications in optical burst transport networks. EO properties of active materials used in the DSs can impose some limitations on their beam deflection efficiencies. Using a test setup with planar silica waveguide microlens arrays, thin-film ferroelectric oxide beam deflectors, and glass volume Bragg gratings, we demonstrate that the beam deflection angle can be increased by more than a factor of 5 for the same switching voltages. The technology enables significant performance improvement of the fast EO DSs.