Fabrication of polymeric large-core waveguides for optical interconnects using a rubber molding process

Polymeric large-core (47 mu m x 41 mu m) optical waveguides for optical int erconnects have been fabricated by using a rubber molding process. For low- cost low-loss large-core waveguides, our newly developed thick-photoresist patterning process is used for a master fabrication. Also a low-loss thermo curable polymer, perfluorocyclobutane (PFCB), is used in fabricating optica l waveguides by rubber molding for the first time. The propagation loss is measured to be 0.4 dB/cm at the wavelength of 1.3 mu m, and 0.7 dB/cm at th e wavelength of 1.55 mu m.