AN INTEGRATED SILICON INTERFEROMETRIC TEMPERATURE SENSOR

An integrated interferometric temperature sensor, realized on a silico n substrate, is presented. The device consists of an array of planar F abry-Perot waveguiding cavities realized by plasma etching and standar d microelectronic techniques. Experimental data demonstrating the moni toring of temperature variation both in modulus and sign, with a resol ution of approximately 1 degrees C, are reported. The influence of the cavity losses and size on the sensor performance is discussed. The re alization of amorphous silicon-based guided-wave sensors is then sugge sted to obtain better temperature resolution.