A set of floating electrodes and a relatively thick buffer layer of lo
w-dielectric constant is Interspaced between the coplanar RF transmiss
ion line and the LiNbO3 substrate containing the optical wave-guide st
ructure, The composite structure is designed to feature a 50-Ohm chara
cteristic impedance, to have an effective dielectric constant equal to
that of the optical wave for close velocity match, and to have a 3 dB
bandwidth of 40 GHz., The purpose of the floating electrodes is to op
timize the modulation sensitivity resulting in an improvement of about
6 dB, As a result, the RF power required for full modulation is lower
than heretofore reported changing over the range from below 2 GHz to
20 GHz, from 44 mW to less than 70 mW, The close agreement between the
theoretical and experimental values of the design parameters demonstr
ates the usefulness of the quasistatic assumption in the analysis of t
he composite structure.