Flexible multimode polymer waveguides for versatile high-speed optical interconnects

In this work, the loss and bandwidth performance of flexible multimode polymer waveguides are investigated under different launch conditions. It is shown that bending excess loss below 2 dB is achieved for radii larger than 3 mm for a 50 µm MMF input, and twisting excess loss below 0.6 dB for up to 1 full 360-degree turn even for a relatively overfilled launch. The bandwidth studies reveal that bending the waveguides does not significantly impact their bandwidth performance, with bandwidth-length product values in excess of 150 GHz×m recorded for the launch conditions studied.