Ultra-Wide Angle MEMS Spatial Light Modulator for LIDAR
28 Jun 17
3:30 PM
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4:20 PM
Light detection and ranging (LIDAR) is a key enabling technology for self-driving cars and other autonomous vehicles. Optical phased arrays (OPA) are attractive for solid-state LIDARs, eliminating bulky mechanical scanners. More importantly, it enables sophisticated beamforming such as simultaneous scanning, pointing, and tracking of multiple objects. OPAs with various types of phase modulators have been demonstrated. Large-scale OPA has been realized with liquid crystal, but its response time is too slow for automotive LIDAR. Large scan angle has been demonstrated in silicon photonics waveguides, however, they have high insertion loss and are limited to infrared wavelength transparent to Si. Micromirror-based OPA offers microsecond response time, but to date the mirror size is larger than 20µm, limiting their scan angles. In this talk we report on a novel MEMS OPA with a pitch below 2 µm. The small pitch is made possible by integrating vertical combdrive actuators underneath the mirror. The fast response time (< 2µs), large field of view (>40° at 1550nm), wavelength- and modulation-agnostic properties make it an attractive choice for solid state LIDARs.