Mach-Zehnder interferometer polarization splitter in InGaAsP/InP

Abstract
A passive TE/TM mode polarization splitter based on a Mach-Zehnder interferometer is demonstrated. Insertion loss of 1.5 db and extinction ratios of /spl minus/19 dB for TE and /spl minus/15 dB for TM have been measured at 1510-nm wavelength. The device attains large optical bandwidth employing a pair of multimode interference (MMI) couplers and a wavelength-tolerant birefringent structure.