Large thermal tuning of a polymer-embedded silicon nitride nanobeam cavity.

Tunable silicon nitride nanophotonic resonators are a critical building block for integrated photonic systems in the visible wavelength range. We experimentally demonstrate a thermally tunable polymer-embedded silicon nitride nanobeam cavity with a tuning efficiency of 44 pm/°C and 0.13 nm/mW in the near-visible wavelength range. The large tuning efficiency comes from the high thermo-optic coefficient of the SU-8 polymer and the "air-mode" cavity design, where a large portion of the cavity field is confined inside the polymer region. The demonstrated resonator will enable locally tunable cavity quantum electrodynamic experiments in the silicon nitride platform.