Silicon light-emitting device for high speed analog-to-digital conversion

Silicon Photonics is an emerging field of research and technology, where nano-silicon can play a fundamental role. Visible light emitted from reverse-biased p-n junctions at highly localized regions, where avalanche breakdown occurs, can be used to realize a visible electro-optical sources in silicon by means of light-emitting diodes (Si-LEDs) is reviewed by characterizing the spectral distribution. Regarding applications, a monolithic optoelectronic integrated circuit (OEIC) for onchip optical interconnection based on standard CMOS technology is discussed. Although there are some of the present challenges with regard to the realization of suitable electro-optical elements for diverse integrated circuit applications, the type of silicon light source can be further developed into be a Si-based optical short-distance on-chip optical interconnect applications. Utilizing silicon electro-optic modulator, monolithic construction of photonics/electronics processing devices used in analog-to-digital conversion, and applications of it to ADCs, the state-of-art photonic technologies for Analog-to-Digital converters (ADCs) is presented.