(An) energy-efficient and high-speed communication link using plastic waveguide

Abstract

For decades, conductor-based electrical interconnects have been widely adopted for various wireline communication systems owing to the interconnect’s cost/power efficiencies. However, the skin effect, caused by electromagnetic induction, imposes a fundamental limitation on the channel bandwidth. As such, it has been generally believed that optical interconnects will eventually replace high-speed electrical interconnects in the foreseeable future. Nevertheless, the widespread use of optical interconnects is severely challenged by the overwhelming replacement cost. Given the barriers, a cost-effective solution should be proposed to replace conventional conductor-based interconnects in high-speed, high-volume, short-reach communication links. The proposed solution, E-TUBE, utilizes the guided-wireless concept, which is implemented by coupling a dielectric waveguide to T/Rx antennas. The limitation of the bandwidth does not exist and the significant improvement on power-efficiency is expected.