CIAN’s mission is to realize manufacturable optoelectronic technologies, particularly network devices that employ silicon-based photonic integrated circuits, to create transformative communication networks that address emerging bottlenecks for data aggregation in regional networks and data centers.
Three sustainability areas have been identified to achieve this mission. CIAN’s three thrusts coincide with the three planes of the three-plane strategic planning chart that is pictured in Figure below . The three-plane chart indicates key technological barriers that are addressed by each thrust.
Thrust 1 - Optical Communication Systems and Network Architectures
Thrust 2 - Scalable Integration and Sub-Systems in Silicon Nanophotonics
Thrust 3 - Device Physics and Fundamentals
These thrusts feed technologies into the CIAN testbeds to realize the overall system and network vision for CIAN. We investigate technological barriers and their solutions in order to accelerate the adoption of these technologies. In the way that electronic integration brought gigahertz class computing into every home, CIAN seeks to develop dense integrated optoelectronics that will bring multi-gigabit per second networking availability to every user, anywhere at any-time, at low cost and with high energy efficiency.
