Graphene Thermal Infrared Emitters Integrated into Silicon Photonic Waveguides.

Cost-efficient and easily integrable broadband mid-infrared (mid-IR) sources would significantly enhance the application space of photonic integrated circuits (PICs). Thermal incandescent sources are superior to other common mid-IR emitters based on semiconductor materials in terms of PIC compatibility, manufacturing costs, and bandwidth. Ideal thermal emitters would radiate directly into the desired modes of the PIC waveguides via near-field coupling and would be stable at very high temperatures.