Optical bistability of a high-Q race-track-resonator based on air-cladded SU-8 optical ridge waveguides

Abstract

We demonstrate optical bistability on a small SU-8 race-track-resonator with a Q-value as high as 30000, which helps to achieve nonlinear optical responses even at low operation power due to an enhancement of optical power density in the resonator. Significant thermal nonlinear optical effect in the fabricated SU-8 race-track-resonator is demonstrated experimentally, which is attributed to the high Q-value and the large negative thermo-optical coefficient.