Astrophotonics: a promising arena for silicon photonics

摘要

Astrophotonics is the application of photonics to astronomical instrumentation. This relatively young and rapidlydeveloping field can play a transformative role in astronomy, offering new functionality, increased efficiency andstability, and allowing traditional large bulk optics instruments to be replaced with miniature scalable modularinstruments. Astrophotonics has reached a stage of maturity in which many prototypes and concepts are nowbeing employed in facility instruments, and the field is transitioning from purely research and design to becomepart of mainstream astronomical instrumentation. As part of this process integrated optical components areplaying an increasingly important role, often supplanting the fibre optics used in early prototypes. In this paperwe provide a brief review of astrophotonics, paying particular attention to those areas in which silicon photonicscan be beneficial, as well as noting the requirements and challenges for silicon astrophotonics.