A flexible polymer waveguide platform with low-loss optical interfaces

Single-mode polymer photonics is important to short-reach data communications, photonic packaging, sensing, and biophotonic light delivery. Mechanical flexibility and manufacturing scalability (e.g., roll-to-roll fabrication compatibility) are among other advantages often cited for these polymer materials. Here we report here experimental demonstration of mechanically flexible waveguides fabricated by using commercial off-the-shelf biocompatible polymers that claim a record low propagation loss of 0.11 dB/cm near 850 nm wavelength ( Fig. 1a ). In addition to their low optical loss, the waveguides also exhibit excellent mechanical flexibility and ruggedness, capable of withstanding over 1,000 bending cycles at 2 mm bending radius [1] .