PI (Physik Instrumente) L.P. Fast Multichannel Photonics Alignment Engine FMPA

The FMPA design is based on a highly specialized digital motion controller (E-712) and a hybrid alignment mechanism to achieve the required long travel ranges without sacrificing stability, resolution or alignment speed. FMPA is implemented in the E-712’s modular firmware to enable fast, simultaneous alignment and tracking of multichannel couplings in multiple degrees of freedom. A broad variety of coarse/fine mechanisms can be used, enabling a spectrum of applications from undiced wafer to final package. Long-travel, closed-loop piezo nano positioners ensure high throughput and reliable reproducibility. High-precision stage stack or hexapod options accommodate any application up to 6 DOFs per coupling. Alignment options include a new multidimensional gradient search for aligning and tracking any number of input and output couplings even if they interact. Scanning and modeling functionalities identify global maxima and accurately determine the centroid of quasi-Gaussian, tilted Gaussian, top-hat and tilted top-hat couplings at high speed. Typical alignment modalities complete within a few hundred milliseconds, and time for gradient search alignment and tracking is virtually independent of the number of couplings and degrees-of-freedom. Silicon Photonics (SiP) means photonic devices are now being fabricated alongside microelectronics on silicon wafers. Testing and packaging these requires nanoscale alignments across multiple channels with high throughput. Testing (especially at the wafer level) and packaging economics both demand extraordinary speed and parallelism. SiP is a mission-critical, industry-wide initiative across the semiconductor field, and also the animating energy behind photonics’ resurgence. PI’s FMPA is the fastest, most flexible, most robust solution.