Data transparent reconfigurable optical interconnections using polarization switching in VCSEL's induced by optical injection

We demonstrate a data transparent reconfigurable optical interconnection sy stem based on optical injection controlled polarization switching in a mast er-slave vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) configuration. A 14 0-Mb/s data stream generated by the slave VCSEL is redirected by an anisotr opic diffractive optical element depending on the polarization state of the emitted light. The polarization of the slave laser is controlled by inject ing an orthogonally polarized optical signal from a master laser, The curre nt modulation of the master VCSEL and the subsequent polarization switching of the slave VCSEL occur at 40 MHz, In our setup, both the data rate and t he optical interconnection reconfiguration rate are limited by the electron ic drive circuitry and could in principle attain the gigahertz range.