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OPEN All‑optical phase control

in nanophotonic silicon waveguides
with epsilon‑near‑zero nanoheaters
Jorge Parra1, Wolfram H. P. Pernice2 & Pablo Sanchis1*

A wide variety of nanophotonic applications require controlling the optical phase without changing
optical absorption, which in silicon (Si) photonics has been mostly pursued electrically. Here, we
investigate the unique light–matter interaction exhibited by epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) materials for
all-optical phase control in nanophotonic silicon waveguides. Thermo-optic all-optical phase tuning
is achieved using an ENZ material as a compact, low-loss, and efficient optical heat source. For a 10-µ
m-long ENZ/Si waveguide, insertion loss below 0.5 dB for the transverse electric (TE) polarization
is predicted together with a high control efficiency of ∼ 0.107π mW−1. Our proposal provides a new
approach to achieve all-optical, on-chip, and low-loss phase tuning in silicon photonic circuits.

The ability to manipulate the phase of light independently of the amplitude is a key challenge in the development
of silicon (Si) photonic integrated circuits (PICs). Pure-phase control enables a broad realm of nanophotonic
applications such as programmable photonic c­ ircuits1, nanophotonic phased a­ rrays2, deep l­ earning3, and quan-
tum ­computing4, to name a few. Most widespread methods for electrically inducing an optical phase shift with
negligible or low optical loss rely either on the silicon thermo-optic coefficient by means of ­microheaters5 or on
p-i-n injection type devices exploiting the silicon plasma ­dispersion6. Optical phase modulation by means of
Pockels effect has also been investigated in silicon waveguides by breaking the crystal symmetry with a highly
stressed layer deposited on t­ op7,8. Alternatively, quadratic electro-optic or DC Kerr effect has been demonstrated
using a p-i-n structure under reverse ­bias9,10. However, to date, the phase modulation efficiency is rather low
with both approaches. Therefore, intense research is devoted to integrating silicon photonic devices with com-
plementary-metal-oxide-semiconductors (CMOS) materials, such as materials with large Pockels c­ oefficient11
or 2D m ­ aterials12, with the aim of achieving faster and more efficient phase tuning driven by an electrical signal.
Pure-phase all-optical modulation can also be obtained by exploiting non-linear effects. Third-order nonlin-
earities are dominant in silicon due to its crystalline nature. Therefore, all-optical phase control may be achieved
by means of the Kerr effect. However, the non-linearity is weak and narrowband cavities or high-power optical
signals are usually required to enhance light-matter interaction (LMI)13–19. Furthermore, such an approach is
not free of optical loss due to the associated large two-photon absorption (TPA) and single-photon absorption
(SPA) processes as well as the generation of free ­carries20. Thereby, the integration of CMOS-compatible materials
in silicon photonics also stands out as a promising route towards all-optical phase modulation. In this context,
epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) photonics holds promise for overcoming some of the limitations found in photonic
integrated devices p ­ latforms21.
Materials featuring near-zero permittivity at telecom wavelengths such as transparent conducting oxides
(TCOs) have pushed silicon photonic devices like modulators to unprecedented and record-breaking
­performances21. The optical properties of TCOs can be largely tuned by changing their carrier concentration. By
embedding the ENZ material in a metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) structure, micron-scale electro-absorption
ENZ/Si modulators have been demonstrated exhibiting GHz-fast modulation rates, low-driving voltages (∼ 2 V),
and optical broadband operation due to the non-resonant ­operation22,23. Such values could be further improved,
achieving high-speed over 40 GHz together with energy consumption as low as 0.4 fJ/bit by using a high-mobility
TCO as ENZ m ­ aterial23. Recently, Mach–Zehnder interferometric modulators using a sub- ENZ/Si electro-static
phase shifter have exhibited an ultra-low VπL of 95 Vµm with prospectsto reduce even further this value down
to 3 Vµm24. Moreover, ultra-compact photonic m ­ emories25 and non-volatile s­ witches26 could be achieved by
using the ENZ material in a flash-like structure similar to electronic memories. On the other hand, very recently,
an all-optical absorption ENZ/Si switch exploiting the large optical nonlinearity of TCOs in its ENZ regime has

1
Nanophotonics Technology Center, Universitat Politècnica de València, Camino de Vera s/n, 46022 Valencia,
Spain. 2Institute of Physics, CeNTech, University of Münster, Heisenbergstr. 11, 48161 Münster, Germany. *email:
[email protected]

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Figure 1.  Illustration of the proposed all-optical phase shifter. The optical heater is an ENZ material that heats
up due to the absorbed optical power of the TM polarized mode. The phase shift is induced for TE polarization
by exploiting the silicon thermo-optic coefficient and leads to low optical loss due to the pass polarizer operation
of the hybrid waveguide section.

been proposed. Modulation strengths of 15.9 dB/µm over a large bandwidth and ultra-fast switching of 230 fs
­ redicted27.
together with ultra-low energies of 13.5 fJ have been p
In the present work, we investigate the utilization of an ENZ material to enable all-optical phase control in
nanophotonic silicon waveguides. A phase shift for TE polarization is induced by exploiting the silicon thermo-
optic coefficient. Such phase shift is optically controlled by means of a cross-polarized TM signal. The heat
originates from a thin layer of ENZ material deposited on top of the waveguide acting as an optical heat source.
The pass polarizer behavior of the hybrid ENZ/Si waveguide provides low optical loss for TE phase shifted signal
but efficient optical-heat conversion for the TM one.

Results
Working principle of thermo‑optic tuning in silicon waveguides with optical ENZ nanoheat-
ers. Figure 1 shows a schematic of the proposed all-optical phase shifter. Absorptive materials can work as
optical heat sources according to the radiative transport equation (RTE) and the resulting energy conservation
­law28,29. In that case, the heat source Q is driven by the energy of the incident beam, i.e., Q ∝ κI , where κ is the
absorption coefficient of the lossy medium and I the optical intensity impinging onto the medium. Particularly,
in a waveguide, κ and I correspond to the effective extinction coefficient, κeff , and the intensity of the mode
propagating through the waveguide, respectively. The value of κeff is the result of the LMI between the optical
mode and the lossy heater. Hence, the key challenge to achieve low optical loss for the phase shifted mode in
combination with a highly efficient optic-heat conversion would be to link the optical loss mainly to polarization
and not to the intrinsic absorption of the heater. A polarization dependent loss operation could be achieved by
reducing the intrinsic loss of the heater and obtaining a strong LMI for TM polarization but weak for TE polari-
zation. Such behavior can be reached by using a heater based on an ENZ material (ε′ = 0) with relatively low
optical loss, ε′′ . In that case, the difference in terms of LMI between both polarizations will be determined by the
boundary conditions. For TM polarization, the major component of the electric field, Ey , is oriented normally to
the interface between the ENZ heater and the silicon waveguide. Thus, giving the continuity of the displacement,
the electric field at the interface of the ENZ material is EENZ = |εSi |/|εENZ |ESi . Note that, for εENZ
′ = 0 and very
low ε (ε < 1), the value of EENZ is greatly enhanced, thus giving rise to strong LMI. On the other hand, for TE
′′ ′′
polarization most of the electric field, Ex , is tangential to the ENZ/Si interface. Then, the boundary condition
for this case is EENZ = ESi . Therefore, there is no electric-field enhancement and thus, since most of the optical
mode is confined within the silicon waveguide, there is very weak LMI. Based on these considerations we design
an optimal ENZ layer for such purposes. The considered ENZ/Si waveguide comprises a standard 500 nm × 220
nm nanophotonic waveguide made from silicon-on-insulator (SOI) with a thin ENZ layer on top. We assume
that the waveguide is covered with a 1-µm-thick SiO2 upper-cladding as in typical silicon PICs to provide protec-
tion against the environment. Information about the material parameters can be found in the “Methods” section.

Optimal ENZ layer: thickness and loss. The optimal thickness and loss of the ENZ layer are obtained
by assessing the figure of merit FOM = κeff TM /κ TE . To this end, we obtained the complex effective index for the
eff
TE and TM mode of the hybrid waveguide by 2D finite element (FEM) simulations (see “Methods” section for
details). Figure 2 shows the values for different εENZ
′′ and layer thicknesses. For the analysis, the considered fun-
damental TM mode corresponds to the solution with highest effective index when the ENZ/Si waveguide sup-
ports multiple propagation TM-polarized modes. For TE polarization, the propagation loss increases with the
thickness and the intrinsic loss of the ENZ material is comparable to lossy dielectrics (Fig. 2a). In contrast, for
TM polarization, we observe a maximum for the different thicknesses (Fig. 2b). This maximum is found in the

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Figure 2.  Derived parameters from the complex effective index of TE and TM modes of the hybrid ENZ/
Si waveguide as a function of the loss of the ENZ material, εENZ
′′ , and for different ENZ layer thickness, t
ENZ .
Propagation loss for (a) TE and (b) TM polarized modes. (c) Figure of merit. (d) Real part of the effective index
for the TE mode. Values are given for  = 1550 nm while imposing εENZ ′ = 0.

region of εENZ
′′ values in which the loss is the result of strong coupling between εENZ
′′ and LMI since LMI is related
to 1/|εENZ |. For εENZ values beyond the maximum, the LMI reduces more than εENZ
′′ ′′ is increased, resulting in
an overall reduction of the optical loss. On the other hand, for values of εENZ′′ > 3 approx., the intrinsic loss of
the ENZ material becomes the dominant factor on the optical loss. As shown in Fig. 2c, the best FOM (∼ 94) is
achieved for εENZ
′′ = 0.17 and 10-nm-thick layer, which corresponds to a propagation loss of 0.041 dB/µm and
3.84 dB/µm for TE and TM modes, respectively. Regarding the impact of the ENZ layer on the optical phase, the
real part of the effective index for the TE mode is shown in Fig. 2d. The effective index of a silicon waveguide
without ENZ material is kept as a reference value. We note that the impact of the ENZ material is very small in
a wide range of εENZ
′′ values and for the different thicknesses due to the weak LMI.

Coupling loss and higher‑order modes. Low loss coupling between the photonic and ENZ/Si wave-
guide mode is also of high importance to efficiently transform the optical power of the TM polarized signal
into heat. We investigate the coupling loss between the silicon and the optimal ENZ/Si waveguide using 3D
finite-difference time-domain (3D-FDTD) simulations (see “Methods” section for details). For TM polarization,
a high coupling efficiency of ∼ 90% (0.45 dB) was obtained (see Supplementary Movie). However, the absorbed
power along the propagation direction (Fig. 3a) revealed the excitation of two TM modes, hereinafter called
ENZ modes because the light is tightly confined in the ENZ layer. For the first mode (ENZ0), the optical absorp-
tion is in good agreement with the propagation loss given in Fig. 2b until z ≈ 1.5 µm. For larger values, the
attenuation fits the second ENZ mode (ENZ1) that features lower propagation loss (1.32 dB/µm). Their complex
effective indices are 1.61 + j0.109 and 1.499 + j0.038, respectively. The Ey field component of the ENZ0 mode
(Fig. 3b) is very similar to the ENZ1 (Fig. 3c) and we attribute this fact the reason to excite both modes in the
hybrid waveguide. Despite the large similarity of the Ey , these modes are different as it can be noted by inspecting
the Ez component (Fig. 3d,e). On the other hand, the nature of the ENZ modes is attributed to be similar to the

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Figure 3.  (a) Absorbed optical power by the ENZ layer along the ENZ/Si waveguide obtained by 3D-FDTD
and fitting with the values of ENZ modes given by FEM. Normalized (b) |Ey | and (d) |Ez | field components of
the ENZ0 mode. (c,e) Same as (b,d) but for the ENZ1 mode. The complex effective index (propagation loss)
is 1.61 + j0.109 (3.84 dB/µm) and 1.499 + j0.038 (1.32 dB/µm) for the ENZ0 and ENZ1 modes, respectively.
Simulations were carried out at  = 1550 nm and for a 10-nm-thick ENZ layer with εENZ = j0.17.

so-called short-range surface plasmon-polariton (SR-SPP) waves, which can be found in very thin metallic layers
(ε′ < 0) surrounded by dielectric materials (ε′ > 0)30.
Nevertheless, the impact of the higher-order ENZ mode is small. In order to absorb ∼ 99% of the opti-
cal power, only 10 µm of length are required for the ENZ/Si waveguide. Moreover, the coupling loss for TE
polarization was also verified to be negligible by using 3D-FDTD simulations and insertion loss was in good
agreement with the propagation loss calculated by FEM. For such length, the resulting overall loss for the TE
mode is ∼ 0.4 dB.

Thermo‑optic response. The thermal response of such ENZ/Si phase shifter was obtained by modeling
the ENZ as a heat source and solving the heat conduction equation (see “Methods” section for details). Figure 4a
shows the normalized temperature increment in the silicon waveguide along the z-axis (light propagation direc-
tion). The accumulated phase shift of the TE mode along the waveguide is shown in Fig. 4b (see “Methods”
section for details). Since there is a thermal gradient along the silicon waveguide, the phase shift begins to occur
some microns before the ENZ/Si waveguide. On the other hand, the relation between the induced phase shift
over the TE mode and the power of the TM polarized signal is ∼ 0.107 π mW−1, resulting in an optical power
for a π phase shift of around 9.5 mW. The temperature distribution for the whole structure for such optical power
is depicted in Fig. 4c. Most of the heat is concentrated in the first microns around the ENZ/Si waveguide due to
the high propagation loss of the ENZ0 mode that leads to the absorption of most of the power. Moreover, this
behavior is enhanced due to the high thermal conductivity of silicon, which generates a strong thermal gradient
around the peak temperature. The temporal switching response was obtained from the evolution of the peak
temperature within the silicon waveguide in the time-domain upon a square pulse (Fig. 4d). The rise/fall time
is around 5.3 µs using the 10-90% rule, in good agreement with heater-based thermo-optic phase shifters and
limited by the low thermal diffusivity of the surrounding SiO2.

Discussion
For practical implementation, an ENZ heater exhibiting such optical properties at telecom wavelengths could
be implemented utilizing TCOs or by forming a mixing media based on the effective medium theory formed
by a host dielectric with metal n ­ anoparticles21. However, TCOs provide a more practical and versatile way to
obtain such ENZ heaters due to the different CMOS-compatible deposition techniques and the ability to pre-
cisely deposit thin films and tailor the optical properties during the deposition process or with a post-annealing
­treatment31–33. The permittivity of TCOs at telecom wavelengths is described by the Drude ­model31

ωp2
 
ε = ε∞ 1 − 2 . (1)
ω + jωŴ

To meet the optimal condition εENZ = j0.17 , the TCO should exhibit ωp ≈ 1.126 × 1015 rad/s and
Ŵ ≈ 0.045ωp , considering a value of 3.8 for the ε∞31. In Ref.31, the authors report ωp = 1.2 × 1015 rad/s and
Ŵ = 0.13ωp for indium tin oxide (ITO). Hence, it seems reasonable to accomplish such optimal material taking

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Figure 4.  (a) Normalized temperature increment in the silicon waveguide, T , and (b) phase increment of the
TE mode, �φ, along the z-axis (propagation direction). (c) Temperature distribution, in ◦ C, for 9.5 mW in the
TM polarized signal. The SiO2 upper-cladding is hidden. (d) Time-domain response of the silicon waveguide
peak temperature upon a 50-µs-wide square pulse.

into account the rapid advances in the synthesis of T ­ COs32,33. Moreover, ITO has been already experimentally
demonstrated as a microheater with good thermal stability for temperatures up to ∼ 650 ◦C34,35.
The underlying heat mechanism is the same as in thermo-optic phase shifters based on Joule heating. There-
fore, similar approaches can be followed to improve the power consumption or time response. The maximum
temperature could be lowered by obtaining a longer but more uniform temperature increment according to Eq.
(5). To this end, the value of κeff could be reduced [see Eqs. (3), (4)] by using an ENZ material with lower ε′′ or
introducing a gap between the silicon waveguide and the heater. However, this would be detrimental by increasing
the power consumption when using the same surrounding materials. A drastic reduction of the optical power
could be obtained by creating air-trenches around the ENZ/Si ­waveguide36. However, it should be noted that the
time response would also be slowed down by a similar margin. On the other hand, one way to improve the time
response would be to use a heat sink or engineering the shape of the excitation p ­ ulse5. Yet, both approaches will
increase the peak optical power, which might give rise to silicon nonlinear effects. Therefore, the optimization
process will depend on the target application.
In conclusion, we have shown the potential of utilizing ENZ materials for optical phase control in silicon
waveguides with ultra-compact lengths and almost negligible insertion losses. Our approach exploits the large
change in terms of LMI between TE and TM polarized optical modes when using a thin ENZ layer (∼ 10 nm)
with relatively low optical loss (εENZ
′′ ≈ 0.17). Under these conditions, the ENZ layer is almost transparent for
TE but highly lossy for TM. Therefore, the ENZ layer acts as an efficient optical heat source and drives a thermo-
optic phase shift of a TE polarized signal with an ENZ/Si waveguide of only 10 µm length and with an efficiency
of ∼ 0.107 π mW−1. Our proposed device underlines the prospects of ENZ/Si integrated photonics and provides
a new approach towards all-optical phase-based applications for the silicon photonic platform.

Methods
Optical and thermal constants used for simulations. The refractive index and thermal constants
used for optical and thermal simulations, respectively, are shown in Table 1. The refractive index is shown at
1550 nm. For the thermal constants, the ENZ material was considered to be ITO. For the silicon thermo-optic
coefficient we used 1.86 × 10−4 K−137.

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Material Refractive index Thermal conductivity (W m−1 K−1) Specific heat capacity (J kg−1 K−1) Density (kg m−3)
Si 3.476 148 703 2230
SiO2 1.444 1.38 709 2203
ENZ 11 1290 7100
 ′′
jεENZ

Table 1.  Optical and thermal constants used for simulations.

Figure 5.  Illustration of the simulated region by 2D-FEM to obtain the optical modes of the ENZ/Si waveguide.
The ENZ layer was removed in the case of the Si-only waveguide.

2D finite element method simulations. The optical modes of the hybrid ENZ/Si and Si-only waveguide
were obtained by 2D-FEM simulations with RSoft FemSIM simulation tool. Figure 5 shows the domain used for
such simulations. This comprised a region from x = 0 to + 1 µm and y = − 1 to + 1 µm. Symmetric boundary
conditions were applied at x = 0 µm to reduce both simulation time and memory considering the symmetry in
the x-axis of the waveguide. The grid size for the x-axis was set to 20 nm. Conversely, a non-unfirm mesh was
used for the y-axis to obtain a good accuracy within the ENZ layer. In this case, the grid size was set to 5 nm with
a minimum subdivision of 10 points.

3D finite‑difference time‑domain simulations. 3D-FDTD simulations with RSoft FullWAVE simula-

tion tool were carried out to investigate the coupling efficiency and optical loss of the ENZ/Si waveguide. The
structure comprised an initial section of a 500-nm-long Si-only waveguide followed by an 11.5-µm-long ENZ/Si
waveguide using a 10-nm-thick ENZ layer with εENZ = j0.17 (nENZ = 0.2915 + j0.2915). Both waveguide sec-
tions were surrounded by SiO2. Figure 6 shows the simulated domain in the YZ plane. The XZ plane is similar
as shown in Fig. 5. The simulation region comprised in the x-axis from x = 0 to x = + 1 µm, in the y = − 1 to
y = + 1 µm, and in the z = − 0.5 to z = + 12 µm. Perfectly matched layer (PML) boundary conditions were
applied to all the boundaries with the aim of avoiding reflections, except at x = 0 in which symmetric boundary
condition was applied. Each PML boundary was formed by 10 PML cells. The waveguide was extended com-
pletely through the PML region to avoid any reflection. For the x- and z-axis a grid size of 20 nm was set. Similar
to FEM simulations, a non-uniform mesh was applied in the ENZ layer with a grid size of 5 nm and a minimum
division of 10 points, i.e., 1 nm of resolution. The TE/TM polarized mode of the Si-only waveguide obtained by
2D-FEM was used as optical excitation. The launch field was located at z = 0 to avoid any interaction with the
PML of the −z boundary. Finally, several monitors were placed along the ENZ/Si waveguide to measure the opti-
cal power. The monitors’ size was 1 µm × 1 µm and the distance between two consecutive monitors was 250 nm.

Definition of the ENZ heat source and thermal simulations. The optical ENZ heat source, QENZ ,
can be described as:
PTM Ŵ ∂
QENZ = [1 − PWG (z)], (2)
wENZ tENZ ∂z
where PTM is the optical power of the photonic TM mode, Ŵ is the coupling efficiency between the photonic and
ENZ/Si waveguide, wENZ and tENZ are the width and thickness of the ENZ layer, respectively, and PWG (z) is the
normalized optical power within the ENZ/Si waveguide along the propagation direction. Considering that PWG (z)

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Figure 6.  Illustration (not to scale) of the simulated region (YZ plane) by 3D-FDTD. Monitors are not
represented for better clarity.

Figure 7.  Illustration (not to scale) of the structure used for thermal simulations. The SiO2 upper-cladding is set
transparent for better clarity of the waveguide.

fits the excitation of the ENZ modes in the short and long region, respectively, then QENZ = QENZ0 + QENZ1.
The value of QENZ0/1 is:
ENZ

ENZ0

PTM Ŵ 4πκeff 0 4πκeff
QENZ0 = exp − (z − z0 ) , (3)
wENZ tENZ  

and
ENZ1

ENZ1

4πκeff 4πκeff
QENZ1 = PWG (z1 ) exp − (z − z1 ) . (4)
 

The ENZ/Si waveguide is assumed to start at z = z0 and z1 is the point from which the optical attenuation is
described by the ENZ1 mode.
3D thermal simulations were conducted by solving the heat conduction equation in the steady-state and
the time-domain with COMSOL Multiphysics simulation tool. Contribution from radiation heat transfer was
assumed to be negligible. Figure 7 illustrates the structure used for such simulations. The ENZ/Si waveguide was
defined using a 10-nm-thick ITO layer with 10 µm of length. The hybrid waveguide was placed in the middle
(z-axis) of the simulation region and the length of the Si-only waveguide extended to 80 µm. The influence of the

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silicon substrate was taken into account setting a dimension (width × height) of 40 µm × 20 µm. The height of
the SiO2 under- and upper-cladding was 3 µm and 1.22 µm (1 µm + Si-wg height). A tetrahedral non-uniform
mesh was used comprising different element sizes. The ITO layer (heat source) was discretized with elements of
sizes between 1 nm and 50 nm. The silicon waveguide utilized elements of between 50 and 200 nm. Finally, the
remaining domains (substrate, under- and upper-cladding) were formed by elements of between 500 nm and
3 µm. Convective heat flux was set as a boundary condition on top of the upper-cladding with a heat transfer
coefficient h = 5 W m−2 K−1. Temperature boundary condition for the remaining boundaries was used by setting
T = 293.15 K (20 ◦C). The heat source in the steady-state was defined following Eqs. (3) and (4). For time-domain
simulations, that value was used for the amplitude of a 50-µs-wide square pulse using a time step of 25 ns.

Phase shift calculation. The phase shift induced to the optical mode, �φ, due to a temperature increment
of the silicon waveguide, TSi , and over a certain length, L, is obtained as:
2π ∂neff L

�φ = �TSi (z)dl , (5)
 ∂T 0
where ∂neff /∂T is the effective index dependence with the temperature due to the silicon thermo-optic coef-
ficient. For a standard silicon waveguide surrounded by SiO2 the value of ∂nneff /∂T = 2 × 10−4 K−1. The same
value was obtained for the ENZ/Si waveguide. As a result, the integral of Eq. (5) should be equal to 3875 K µm
to obtain a π phase shift at  = 1550 nm.

Received: 1 February 2021; Accepted: 19 April 2021

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Acknowledgements
This work is supported by Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (PID2019-111460GB-I00, FPU17/04224) and
Generalitat Valenciana (PROMETEO/2019/123).

Author contributions
J.P. proposed, designed and simulated the concept, and wrote the initial draft of the manuscript. J.P., W.H.P.P.
and P.S. discussed the results and revised the manuscript.

Competing interests
The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information
Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at https://​doi.​org/​
10.​1038/​s41598-​021-​88865-6.
Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to P.S.
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