Parallel Directional Coupler based Dual-Polarization Electro-Absorption Modulator using Epsilon Near-Zero Material

Electro–optical modulation, where a radio frequency signal can be encoded in an optical field, is crucial to decide the overall performance of an integrated photonics system. Due to the growing internet penetration rate worldwide, polarization-division-multiplexing (PDM) technique has emerged to increase the link capacity, where polarization-independent modulators are desirable to reduce system complexity. In this study, we propose a novel parallel directional coupler based dual-polarization electro-absorption modulator based on epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) material. The proposed design is capable of independent and synchronized modulation of two fundamental modes viz. transverse magnetic (TM) and transverse electric (TE) mode of a standard silicon rib waveguide. Indium-tin-oxide (ITO)–Silicon based two parallel hybrid plasmonic waveguides (HPW1 and HPW2) are placed such that fundamental TM (TE) mode of the input bus waveguide can be coupled to HPW1 (HPW2). The ENZ-state of ITO, acquired upon two independent electrical gating, enables large modulation depth by utilizing enhancement of electric field at the absorptive carrier accumulation layer. With a 27 μm active length, the extinction ratio (ER) of the proposed design is 10.11 dB (9.66 dB) for TM (TE) modulation at 1550 nm wavelength. This results in a 0.45 dB ER-discrepancy and indicates the polarization-insensitive nature of the modulator. The insertion losses and modulation bandwidths of our design are less than 1 dB and more than 100 GHz, respectively, for both polarizations over the entire C-band of wavelength. The proposed design can find potential applications in the PDM-enabled integrated photonics systems and high speed optical interconnections at data center networks.

Characteristic Analysis of Dual-Polarization Weather Radar Echoes of Convective Precipitation and Snowfall in the Mount Everest Region

This paper introduces the X-band weather radar dual-polarization parameters of isolated convective cell precipitation and meso/microscale snowfall on Mount Everest and presents the first precipitation observations based on dual-polarization weather radar in this area. Compared with the Chengdu Plain, Mount Everest experienced convective precipitation on smaller horizontal and vertical scales with a narrower Zdr probability density spectrum (uniformly distributed around approximately 0). The Zh profile on Mount Everest displayed two peaks, unlike that over the plains, and the precipitation at the strong convective core was denser. Furthermore, during winter snowfall on the northern slope of Mount Everest, when the boundary layer exhibited sufficient water vapor and dynamic uplift, due to the low boundary layer temperature (<0 °C), water vapor produced stratiform clouds in the middle and lower layers (approximately 1.5 km above ground level (AGL)). Water vapor condensation at 1.5–2.5 km AGL led to latent heat release, which increased the temperature of regional stratiform clouds with increasing height. Consequently, the temperature at the stratiform cloud top height (2.5 km AGL) unexpectedly exceeded 0 °C. Additionally, the −20 °C isotherm was at approximately 4 km AGL, indicating that the middle- and upper-layer atmospheric temperatures remained low. Therefore, thermal instability occurred between the stratiform cloud top height and the middle/upper atmosphere, forming convective motion. These findings confirm the occurrence of elevated winter snowfall convection above Mount Everest and may have certain reference value for retrieving raindrop size distributions, quantitatively estimating precipitation, and parameterizing cloud microphysical processes in numerical prediction models for the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau.