All-optical signal-conversion efficiency with a parameter-dependent four-wave-mixing process in a silicon nanowaveguide

We report on experimental measurements of the signal-wavelength conversion efficiency through the four-wave-mixing (FWM) process in a silicon strip nanowaveguide (SiNW) compared with theoretically-calculated results. The conversion efficiency has been investigated as a function of various parameters, such as the pump power and the pump and signal wavelengths. The measured and the calculated results indicate that a significant variation of the chromatic dispersion (CD) of our test SiNW device among the pump, signal and idler beam wavelengths and a high insertion loss in the device cause a very low FWM conversion efficiency. Our simulation tool can provide a direction for further improvement in the waveguide design by providing optimized CD values for the SiNW in desired ranges of the operation wavelengths.