MIT and PhotonDelta announce PIC roadmap
Integrated photonics initiative involves contributions from more than 400 organisations
More than 400 technology, academic and industrial organisations from around the world have contributed to a new integrated photonics roadmap (IPSR-I) led by the Netherlands-based foundation PhotonDelta and the Microphotonics Center at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the USA.
IPSR-I includes a comprehensive overview of major technology gaps for volume manufacturing of Photonic Integrated Circuits (PICs) and a detailed analysis of the challenges that the integrated photonics industry needs to overcome to achieve its potential.
The integration of photonics with electronics is the key enabler for the creation of smaller, faster and more energy-efficient devices. The integration has the potential to expand functionality and create a large number of new applications and is helping to unlock major advancements in many areas including autonomous vehicles, data telecom and healthcare. Integrated photonics is also the technology that generates, processes, and detects light for sensing and communication applications.
Peter van Arkel (pictured above), CTO of PhotonDelta, said: “Getting all research and development resources of the integrated photonics industry and academia behind solving the technological gaps identified by the IPSR-I, will contribute to solving the large societal challenges in a spectacular manner. At the heart of the roadmap is a global approach for the integrated photonics industry to rally behind to meet core challenges. Reaching a consensus on these technological gaps has been very challenging with such a diverse group of contributors. Looking at the results, it has definitely been worth it.”
Lionel Kimerling, Thomas Lord Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at MIT, said: “Electronic-photonic integration has the capacity to radically transform a whole host of industries and unlock a range of new technologies that will change our lives. Transitioning this vision to high volume manufacturing requires a well thought out plan built on the knowledge of a huge range of experts across different fields, organisations and nations. This is what IPSR-I has achieved - it outlines a clear way forward and specifies an innovative learning curve for scaling performance and applications for the next 15 years.”
The full roadmap can be downloaded from: www.photondelta.com/ipsri-2024/
