Past Research

Kim Winick/Research/Past Research

Holographic Optical Elements (Graduate Student Days)

Professor Winick’s earliest work involved the design of optimum holographic optical elements. This work, completed while he was a graduate student at the University of Michigan and part-time employee at ERIM, represents one of the first treatments of this subject. In reference [28] design techniques for holographic optical elements that are recorded at one wavelength yet operated at a second and different wavelength were investigated. An analytic design procedure was developed that produced holographic optical elements that had both diffraction-limited aberration performance and high diffraction efficiency. In related work [27, 59], an analytic technique was also developed for designing flat, aspheric, holographic optical elements that can image a finite set of input wave fronts into a finite set of output wave fronts while minimizing the average mean-squared wave front error. Although both of these subjects had been previously studied, earlier designs methodologies relied solely on numerical optimization routines and did not use analytic design techniques.

Optical Communications Research (MIT Lincoln Laboratory)

In 1981 Professor Winick completed his Ph.D. degree and joined the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Lincoln Laboratory. At MIT he was involved with millimeter wave and free-space optical communication system design. As a Member of the Technical Staff, he developed algorithms for acquisition and tracking [25], performed atmospheric turbulence studies and measurements [23, 26], and completed the first critical experimental studies of the spatial mode matching efficiencies achievable with a pair of AlGaAs semiconductor lasers [24]. The work reported in [25] was part of an effort to develop an optical heterodyne communication link between a deep-space satellite and a ground station. Proper ground station operation required that the earth-based receiving telescope acquire and maintain micro-radian pointing precision using a CCD centroid tracker. In [25] fundamental limits were derived for the accuracy of any centroid tracking algorithm using a two-dimensional Cramer-Rao bound. These results were then applied to find a lower bound for the mean-squared error of any unbiased CCD-based position estimator operating in the presence of Poisson statistics. The maximum-likelihood centroid estimator was also derived and presented in this paper. In [24] high efficiency heterodyne detection was demonstrated using semiconductor lasers. In particular, spatial mode matching efficiencies of seventy-five percent were demonstrated, with good repeatability, when two GaAlAs semiconductor lasers were mixed on a photodetector to produce a beat signal. Furthermore, the experimentally measured mode matching efficiency of seventy-five percent was shown to be in close agreement with theoretical predictions based on amplitude and phase measurements of the laser beams’ profiles.

Grating-Based Waveguide Filter Design and Fabrication (University of Michigan)

In 1988 Dr. Winick joined the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department at the University of Michigan and established an experimental and theoretical program in glass/crystal integrated optics. His early work at the University involved the development and application of new waveguide grating filter design techniques [17, 21, 22,52, 53, 54]. In [22] an iterative Fourier transform filter design technique was reported, while in [17, 52, 53] inverse scattering methods, borrowed from quantum mechanics, were used to design optical filters. In [17] and [52] the power of this later approach, known as the Gel’fand-Levitan-Marchenko inverse scattering method, was illustrated through the design of a dispersion-compensating waveguide filters for use on a high speed fiber optic communication link. An integrated optic dispersion compensator, based on chirped waveguide gratings, was subsequently fabricated and characterized [11, 12].

Waveguide Gratings and Ion Exchanged Glass Devices (University of Michigan)

In 1993 Professor Winick’s group demonstrated that Bragg gratings could be directly (optically) written in ion exchangeable glass by bleaching defect sites created by gamma ray irradiation [16,46]. Many multi-component ion exchangeable glasses are not conventionally (i.e., 244 nm UV) photosensitive, and thus this result extended direct-write methods to a larger class of host materials. In 2004 Professor Winick’s group expanded the work of Ramaswamy and demonstrated that very efficient short waveguide gratings could be realized on glass substrates by using thin patterned silicon overlays [2,5, 33, 34]. Both DBR waveguide laser arrays [5] and optical add/drop demultiplexers [1] for fiber optic telecommunication systems were demonstrated by Winick et al. using this technique.

Glass/Crystal Waveguide Lasers and Amplifiers (University of Michigan)

In the late 1980s and early 1990s planar glass waveguide lasers were becoming a topic of

considerable interest. In 1992 Professor Winick et al. monolithically integrated a waveguide Bragg grating with a rare earth-doped glass waveguide laser to demonstrate the first distributed Bragg reflector (DBR) glass waveguide laser [18, 50]. Although this work was new at the time, these devices are sufficiently important so that they are now commonplace. Professor Winick has continued to work in the area of waveguide lasers and amplifiers. His research group reported, simultaneously with two other groups, the first erbium:ytterbium co-doped glass waveguide laser in 1995 [13, 42]. These lasers are important devices due to the fact that their emission wavelength lies in the primary fiber optic telecommunications band located in the vicinity of 1500 nm. The first ytterbium glass waveguide lasers were also demonstrated and analyzed by Winick et al. in 1999 [9], and in 1995 Winick et al. demonstrated amplification in a chromium Cr3+ -indiffused lithium niobate waveguide [43]. A small signal gain of approximately 1.6 dB was measured at 838 nm using 36 mW of 488 nm launched pump power. The broad emission bandwidth of chromium-doped lithium niobate, the commercial availability of laser diode pump sources that operate within this material’s broad pump absorption bands, and the electro-optic properties of lithium niobate, make chromium-doped lithium niobate a promising substrate for widely tunable and short-pulse, diode-pumped, waveguide lasers. In 1998 Professor Winick wrote an invited review article on the subject of rare earth-doped waveguide lasers in glass and lithium niobate [41]. In the following year, he investigated longitudinal mode competition in chirped grating distributive feedback lasers using a perturbation stability analysis [8, 38]. This stability analysis demonstrated that the two lowest order degenerate longitudinal modes in an index-coupled DFB laser would lase simultaneously when the index grating was chirped asymmetrically along the axis of the device. By beating the two modes together on a photodetector, such a laser could be used to generate a spectrally pure microwave signal.

New Waveguide Fabrication Techniques (University of Michigan)

Recently there has been considerable interest in the use of femtosecond laser pulses to directly induce refractive index changes inside transparent bulk dielectric materials. Professor Winick’s group and his colleagues did some of the earliest research on this topic [4, 7, 32, 35,37]. In particular, in 2000 they demonstrated the first active device, a neodymium-doped waveguide amplifier, fabricated using femtosecond optical pulses. [7]. In subsequent work, they characterized waveguides and gratings produced using this writing method and demonstrated the most complex-device, an optical add/drop demultiplexer, that had yet been reported [4, 32, 35, 37].

Information Theory and Coding (University of Michigan)

In the areas of information theory and coding Professor Winick et al. has published a series of papers [1, 3, 10, 14, 15]. In the first of these papers, the fundamental performance limits (i.e., error exponents) of codes that operate on very noisy channels was investigated, and the results were applied to optical communications. In two subsequent papers [10, 14], the error-correcting capability of runlength-constrained codes was investigated. This class of codes has played an important role in optically-based storage media. Finally, Professor Winick’s most recent work [1, 3] has involved applications of low density parity check (LDPC) codes. During the last several years the power of these codes has become widely recognized. In [3] Winick et al. applied LDPC codes to a bandwidth efficient modulation scheme that utilized multi-level coding, multi-stage decoding, and trellis-shaping. Our main contribution here was to realize that multi-level coding could be used with trellis-shaping (a technique propose by Forney) to control the channel input symbol probabilities. By optimizing the probabilities associated with our non-equally likely QAM signaling scheme, we could greatly enhance performance. Operation within 0.81 dB of the Shannon channel capacity was demonstrated. Finally, in [1] the performance of joint channel state estimation and decoding of LDPC codes was analyzed over the two-state useless/noiseless binary symmetric channel. The advantages of implementing joint state estimation and decoding, as opposed to decoding alone, were quantified and shown to be significant.

References

  1. Vijacksungsithi and K. A. Winick, “Performance of Joint Channel State Estimation and Decoding of Low-Density Parity-Check Codes,” IEEE Transactions on Commun., to appear.
  2. J. Kim, G. Li, and K. A. Winick, “Design and Fabrication of Glass Waveguide Optical Add-Drop Multiplexer using Amorphous Silicon Overlay Distributed Bragg Reflector,” Applied Optics , pp. 671-677, vol. 43, Jan. 2004.
  3. P. Limpaphayom and K. A. Winick, “Power and Bandwidth Efficient Communications Using LDPC Codes,” IEEE Transactions on Commun. , pp. 350-354, vol. 52, no. 3, Mar. 2004.
  4. C. Florea and K. A Winick, “Fabrication and Characterization of Photonic Devices Directly-Written in Glass Using Femtosecond Laser Pulses ,” J. of Lightwave Technol. , pp. 246-253, vol. 21, no.1 Jan. 2003.
  5. J. Kim, K. A. Winick, C. Florea and M. McCoy, “Design and Fabrication of Low-loss Hydrogenated Amorphous Si Overlay DBR,” J. Select. Topics in Quantum Electron.,pp.1307-1315, vol. 8, no. 6, Nov./Dec. 2002.
  6. A. Kuditcher, M. P. Hehlen, C. M. Florea, K. A. Winick, and S. C. Rand, “Intrinsic Bistability of Luminescence and Stimulated Emission in Yb- and Tm-Doped Glass,” Phys. Rev. Lett. , vol. 84, pp. 1898-1901, 2000.
  7. Y. Sikorski, A. A. Said, P. Bado, R. Maynard, C. Florea and K. A. Winick, “Optical Waveguide Amplifier in Nd-doped Glass Written with Near-IR Femtosecond Laser Pulses,”Elect. Lett ., vol. 36, pp. 226-227, 2000.
  8. K. A. Winick, “Longitudinal Mode Competition in Chirped Grating DFB Lasers,” IEEE J. of Quantum Electronics , vol. 35, pp. 1402-1411, 1999.
  9. C. Florea and K. A. Winick, “Ytterbium-Doped Glass Waveguide Laser Fabricated by Ion Exchange,” IEEE J. of Lightwave Technology , vol. 17, pp. 1593-1601, 1999.
  10. K. A. Winick and S.-H Yang, “Upper Bounds on the Size of Error-Correcting Runlength-Limited Codes,” European Transactions on Telecommunications , vol. 7, pp. 273-284, 1996.
  11. C. J. Brooks, G. L. Vossler and K. A. Winick, “Integrated Optic Dispersion Compensator Using Chirped Gratings,” Opt. Lett ., vol. 20, pp. 368-370, 1995.
  12. C. J. Brooks, G. L. Vossler and K. A. Winick, “Phase Response Measurement Technique for Waveguide Grating Filters,” Appl. Phys. Lett. , vol. 66, pp. 2168-2170, 1995.
  13. G. L. Vossler, C. J. Brooks and K. A. Winick, “Planar Er:Yb Glass Ion Exchanged Waveguide Laser,” Elect. Lett ., vol. 31, pp. 1162-1163, Jul. 1995.
  14. S.-H. Yang and K. A. Winick, “Asymptotic Bounds on the Size of Error-Correcting Recording Codes,” IEE Proc.-Commun ., vol. 141, pp. 365-370, Dec. 1994.
  15. S. Lee and K.A. Winick, “Reliability Functions and Exponentially Optimum Codes for a Class of Very Noisy Channels,” IEEE Trans. Inform. Theory , vol. 40, pp. 647-661, 1994.
  16. J. E. Roman and K. A. Winick, “Photowritten Gratings in Ion-Exchanged Glass Waveguides,” Optics Lett. , vol. 18, pp. 808-810, May 1993.
  17. J.E.Roman and K.A. Winick, “Waveguide Grating Filters for Dispersion Compensation and Pulse Compression,” IEEE J.Quantum Electron. , vol. 29, pp. 975-982, Mar. 1993.
  18. J. E. Roman and K. A. Winick, “Neodymium-Doped Glass Channel Waveguide Laser Containing an Integrated Distributed Bragg Reflector,” Appl. Phys. Lett. , vol. 61, pp. 2744-2746, Dec. 1992.
  19. J. Bernays, G.M. Carter, and K.A. Winick, “Wideband Heterodyne Spatial Tracking for Optical Space Communications,” Optical Engineering , vol. 31:03, pp. 590-601, Mar. 1992.
  20. K. A. Winick, “Effective-Index Method and Coupled-Mode Theory for Almost-Periodic Waveguide Gratings: A Comparison,” Appl. Optics , vol. 31, pp. 757-764, Feb. 1992.
  21. K.A. Winick, “Design of Grating-Assisted Waveguide Couplers with Weighted Coupling,”IEEE J. Lightwave Technol. , vol. 9, pp. 1481-1492, Nov. 1991.
  22. K.A. Winick and J.E. Roman, “Design of Corrugated Waveguide Filters by Fourier Transform Techniques,” IEEE J. Quantum Electron. , vol. 26, pp. 1918-1929, Nov. 1990.
  23. K.A. Winick and D. vL. Marquis, “Stellar Scintillation Technique for Measurement of Tilt Anisoplanatism,” J. Optical Society of America A , vol. 5, pp. 1929-1936, Nov. 1988.
  24. K.A. Winick and P. Kumar, “Spatial Mode Matching Efficiencies for Heterodyned GaAlAs Semiconductor Lasers,” IEEE J. of Lightwave Technol. , vol. 6, pp. 513-520, Apr. 1988.
  25. K.A. Winick, “Cramer-Rao Lower Bounds on the Performance of Charge Coupled Device Optical Position Estimators,” J. Optical Society of America A , vol. 3, pp. 1809-1815, Nov. 1986.
  26. K.A. Winick, “Atmospheric Turbulence-Induced Fades on Optical Heterodyne Communications Links,” Applied Optics , vol. 25, pp. 1817-1825, Jun. 1986.
  27. K.A. Winick and J.R. Fienup, “Optimum Holographic Elements Recorded With Nonspherical Wave Fronts,” J. Optical Society of America , vol. 73, pp. 208-217, Feb. 1983.
  28. K.A. Winick, “Designing Efficient Aberration-Free Holographic Lenses in the Presence of a Construction-Reconstruction Wavelength Shift.”J. Optical Society of America , vol. 72, pp. 143-148, Jan. 1982.
  29. A. Tai and K.A. Winick, “Effects of the Emulsion Refractive Index on Achromatic Grating Interferometer Applications,” Applied Optics , vol. 20, pp. 3478-3481, Oct. 1981.
  30. G. Li , K. A. Winick, B. Youmans, and E. A. J. Vikjaer, “Design, Fabrication and Characterization of an Integrated Optic Passive Resonator for Optical Gyroscopes,” Session A3, Institute of Navigation Annual Meeting, Dayton, OH, June 7-9, 2004
  31. G. Li and K. A. Winick, “Integrated Optics Ring Resonator Fabricated by Silver Ion-Exchange in Glass,” paper CWA63, Conf. on Lasers and Electrooptics (CLEO), San Francisco , May 16-21, 2004.
  32. K. A. Winick, C. Florea, A. A. Said, M, dugan and Ph. Bado, “Fabrication and Characterization of Photonic Devices Written in Glass With Femtosecond Lasers,” invitedpaper CtuF6, Conf. on Lasers and Electrooptics (CLEO), San Francisco , May 16-21, 2004.
  33. J. Kim, K. A. Winick, C. Florea and M. McCoy, “Design and Fabrication of Low-loss Hydrogenated Amorphous Si Overlay DBR for Glass Waveguide Devices,” SPIE Photonics West , paper 4990-32, San Jose, CA, 25-31 Jan. 2003.
  34. J. Kim, K. A. Winick and C. Florea, “Passive and Active Glass Waveguide Devices Utilizing Silicon Overlay Grating,” Integrated Photonics Research OSA Topical Meeting, Vancouver , CA., July 17-19, 2002.
  35. K. A. Winick, C. Florea and A. A. Said, “Fabrication of Photonic Devices in Glass Using Femtosecond Pulses,” paper ThAA1 (invited) , Annual Optical society of America Meeting, Long Beach, CA, Oct. 14-18, 2001.
  36. Y. Sikorski, A. Said, M. Dugan, R. Maynard, P. Bado, C. Florea and K. A. Winick, “Using Femtosecond Lasers to Micromachine Integrated Optical Devices,” International Conference on Industrial Applications of Lasers (ICALEO 2000), Dearborn, MI, Oct. 2-5 2000.
  37. C. Florea, K. A. Winick, Y. Sikorski, A. Said, and P. Bado, “Optical Waveguide Amplifier in Nd-Doped Glass Written with Near-IR Femtosecond Laser Pulses,” Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics (CLEO 2000), paper # CMX5, San Francisco, May 2000.
  38. K. A. Winick, “Longitudinal Mode Competition in Chirped Grating DFB Lasers,” 1999Annual Meeting of the Optical Society of America , paper # WJ5, Sept. 26-Sept. 30, 1999, Santa Clara, Ca.
  39. C. Florea and K. A. Winick, “Ytterbium-Doped Glass Waveguide Laser,” 1999 Annual Meeting of the Optical Society of America , paper # WJ8, Sept. 26-Sept. 30, Santa Clara CA.
  40. A. Kuditcher, M. P. Hehlen, C. M. Florea, K. W. Winick, and S.C. Rand, “Intrinsic Multistability of Yb and Tm Luminescence and Stimulated Emission in Oxide Glass,” paper # QThG18 , Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics (CLEO’99), Baltimore, MD., May 23-29, 1999.
  41. K. A. Winick, “Rare Earth-Doped Waveguide Lasers in Glass and LiNbO 3 : A Review(invited) , in SPIE Proceedings, vol. 3280, pp. 88-104, Rare Earth-Doped Devices II , paper #3280-13, SPIE Photonics West , San Jose, CA., Jan. 24-30, 1998.
  42. K. A. Winick, “Erbium:Ytterbium Planar Waveguide Laser in Ion-Exchanged Glass,” in SPIE Proceedings, vol. 2996, pp. 121-134, Rare Earth-Doped Devices , 121-134, SPIE Photonics West , San Jose, CA., Feb. 10-11, 1997.
  43. G. L. Vossler, C. J. Brooks and K. A. Winick, “Chromium Indiffused LiNbO 3 Waveguide Amplifier,” paper CFJ5, Conference on Lasers and Electro- Optics (CLEO95), Anaheim, CA., Jun. 2-7, 1995.
  44. S-H. Yang and K.A. Winick, “Constrained Write-Once Memory or Efficient Ways of Using Pens and Paper,” International Conference on Communications , Hsinchu, Taiwan, Dec. 7-10, 1993.
  45. K.A. Winick, “Rare Earth-Doped Waveguide Lasers,” Annual Meeting Lasers and Electro-Optics Society (LEOS 93) San Jose, CA, Nov. 15-19, 1993 (Invited) .
  46. K.A. Winick and J.E. Roman, “Photowritten Gratings in Ion Exchanged Glass Waveguides,”Annual Optical Society of America Meeting , Toronto, Canada, Oct. 3-8, 1993.
  47. K.A. Winick and S-H. Yang, “Asymptotic Bounds on the Rates of Runlength-Limited Codes,” International Symposium on Information Theory , San Antonio, TX, January 17-22, 1993.
  48. K.A. Winick, “Glass Integrated Optics: Active and Passive Devices,” Optics and Quantum Electronics Seminar Series, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department, Oct.14, 1993 (Invited) .
  49. S. Lee and K.A. Winick, “Error Exponents and Exponentially Optimum Codes for a Class of Very Noisy Channels,” Annual Conference on Information Sciences and Systems, Princeton, NJ, Mar. 18-20, 1992.
  50. K.A. Winick and J.E. Roman, “Neodymium-Doped Glass Channel Waveguide Laser Containing an Integrated Distributed Bragg Reflector ,” Annual Optical Society of America Meeting , post-deadline paper , Albuquerque, NM, Sep. 20-25, 1992.
  51. J. E. Roman and K. A. Winick, “Neodymium-Doped Ion-Exchanged Waveguide Laser in Germanium Rich Soda-Lime Silicate Glass ,” Annual Optical Society of America Meeting , Albuquerque, NM, Sep. 20-25, 1992.
  52. K.A. Winick and J.E. Roman, “Dispersion Compensation and Pulse Compression Using Waveguide Grating Filters,” Annual Optical Society of America Meeting , San Jose, CA, Nov. 3-8, 1991.
  53. K.A. Winick, “Design of Codirectionally-Coupled Waveguide Filters Using the GLM Technique,” Annual Optical Society of America Meeting , Boston, MA., Nov. 4-9, 1990.
  54. K.A. Winick and J.E. Roman, “Design of Corrugated Waveguide Filters by Fourier Transform Techniques,” Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics, Anaheim (CLEO 90), CA, May 12-17, 1990.
  55. K.A. Winick and D. vL. Marquis, “Stellar Scintillation Technique for the Measurement of Tilt Anisoplanatism ,” Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics, Anaheim (CLEO 88) , CA, April 25-29, 1988.
  56. K.A. Winick and P. Kumar, “Spatial Mode Matching Efficiencies for Heterodyned GaAlAs Semiconductor Lasers ,” Optical Society of America Annual Meeting , Rochester, NY, Oct. 18-23, 1987.
  57. K.A. Winick, “Cramer-Rao Lower Bounds on the Performance of CCD Optical Position Estimators,” Optical Society of America Annual Meeting , Seattle, WA, Oct. 19-24, 1986.
  58. K. A. Winick, “Atmospheric Turbulence-Induced Fades on Optical Heterodyne Communication Links,” Global Telecommunications Conference , Atlanta, GA. Nov. 26-29, 1984.
  59. K.A. Winick and J.R. Fienup, “Optimum Holographic Elements Recorded with Nonspherical Wave Fronts,” Optical Society of America Annual Meeting , Tucson, AZ, Oct. 18-22, 1982.
  60. B. J. Chang and K.A. Winick, “Holographical Optical Elements (HOEs),” Proceedings of SPIE , vol. 299, 157-162, 1981.
  61. K.A. Winick, “Holographically Produced Interference Filters,” Optical Society of America Annual Meeting , Chicago, Oct. 14-17, 1980.
  62. B.J. Chang and K.A. Winick, “Silver-Halide Gelatin Holograms ,” Proceedings of SPIE (in Recent Advances in Holography, vol. 215), Los Angeles, CA, Feb. 4-7, 1980.