Review of Finite Element Characterization of Photonic Devices

We report the development and applications of finite-element-based numerical approaches for the characterization of a wide range of photonic devices. The full-vectorial finite-element method is considered for the modal solutions of uniform guided-wave sections and the least-squares boundary residual method is used to calculate the scattering coefficients for butt-coupled uniform waveguide sections. Several guided-wave components are discussed and their operating characteristics are illustrated. Particular emphasis is given to key photonic components such as the spot-size converters, Bragg gratings, polarization splitters, polarization rotators, multimode interference-based devices and modulators. Valuable results relating to the design and characterization of these important photonic components are presented