Bogdan Dryzhakov is a Research Scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences, where he develops functional materials, device platforms, and characterization capabilities in service of the facility’s research community. His research at ORNL centers on the structure-property relationships of novel ferroelectric materials, the fabrication of quantum photonic circuits, and AI-driven workflows in spectroscopic materials characterization. Prior to ORNL, Bogdan earned a BS in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2016, scaled electrochemical processes at a startup, and completed his PhD at University of Tennessee at Knoxville in 2023 studying spin and polarization order in hybrid organic-inorganic materials.
Presentation Title:
Scalable Quantum Photonic Integrated Circuits based on Aluminum Nitride Waveguides
Presentation Abstract:
Quantum photonic circuits demand scalable platforms with low-loss UV-IR routing, single-mode confinement, χ(2) nonlinearity, and CMOS compatibility. Aluminum nitride (AlN) is therefore compelling as it combines optical advantages such as a wide spectral window and ferroelectricity for generating nonclassical states of light, is sputtered at wafer scale, and additionally, demonstrates environmentally robust properties. We present an AlN photonic integrated circuit platform, discussing the fabrication and design challenges in achieving χ(2) nonlinear processes for on-chip quantum light generation. Through co-design principles spanning modeling to fabrication that matured the process across material growth, lithographic fabrication, and device testing, the demonstrated nonlinear photonic platform achieved single-mode operation at 1550 nm with propagation losses as low as ~1 dB cm-1 and Q-factors exceeding 200,000. These results establish ferroelectric AlN as a viable platform for scalable quantum interconnects and integrated quantum technologies.