Academic researchers support DARPA chip-scale integrated photonics programme

The Research Foundation for the State University of New York is joining the DARPA-run Lasers for Universal Microscale Optical Systems (LUMOS) programme under a $19.21 million research contract.

LUMOS ‘will enable efficient on-chip optical gain to highly capable integrated photonics platforms and enable complete photonics functionality on a single substrate for disruptive optical microsystems’, the DoD noted on 14 September.  

Work will be performed in Albany, New York (48%); Santa Barbara, California (21%); Boston, Massachusetts (26%); and Greensboro, North Carolina (5%), with an expected completion date of September 2024.  

LUMOS aims to bring high-performance lasers and amplifiers to manufacturable photonics platforms ‘through heterogeneous integration of diverse materials’, according to the DARPA website.

In particular, the programme seeks to develop integrated photonics technology along three vectors: scaling complexity, scaling power, and scaling spectrum. 

For scaling across the spectrum, LUMOS aims to create photonic circuits with integrated lasers operating across the visible spectrum with a wavelength-by-design methodology to enable atomic microsystems for positioning, navigation, and timing applications, as well as compact quantum sensors and information processing systems.

As part of our promise to deliver comprehensive coverage to our Defence Insight and Premium News subscribers, our curated defence news content provides the latest industry updates, contract awards and programme milestones.