Athermal silica-based arrayed-waveguide gratingmultiplexer using bimetal plate temperature compensator

Abstract
A simple and successful technique for realising an athermal silica-based arrayed-waveguide grating (AWG) is described. By applying strain to the waveguide using a bimetal plate, the centre wavelength shift caused by the thermo-optic effect is cancelled out by the strain-optic effect. The wavelength shift is smaller than 0.05 nm between 25 and 77°C for an AWG chip attached to a bimetal plate.