Realization of a Diffraction-Based Optical Switch

Rachel Sampson¹ and Pierre-Alexandre Blanche²

¹Department of Physics and Astronomy, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY 11794-3800, USA
²The College of Optical Sciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA

A 1x100 diffraction-based optical switch was designed for use in data centers. The switch is bandwidth-invariant, can be rapidly reconfigure, and allows for send- and receive-side components to be scaled independently. The switch was modeled in Zemax and seves as a proof-of-concept.