All-photonic millimeter-wave and terahertz signal core at room and cryogenic temperatures
Millimeter-wave and terahertz technologies offer new opportunities for high-capacity communications, sensing, and quantum systems, but electronic signal chains above 100 GHz are limited by weak sources, noisy receivers, and lossy interconnects. Photonic approaches mitigate these constraints by enabling chip-scale high-frequency components, yet existing implementations generally retain lossy off-chip electrical or free-space links, hindering dense and compact integration for cryogenic or space-constrained settings. Here, we show a monolithic lithium tantalate photonic chip, termed a signal core, which generates, modulates, routes, and detects continuous-wave signals at discrete frequencies between 100 GHz and 2.5 THz. The architecture integrates high-frequency functional modules on chip and uses exclusively fiber-based optical interfaces. Bidirectional coherent electro-optic conversion enables signal generation, detection, and nanosecond-scale amplitude and phase modulation, while micro-coplanar striplines interconnect the modules into an end-to-end signal chain on a single chip. Our modules achieve single-photon electro-optic coupling rates of g_0/2π=10 kHz and peak drive-power-normalized photon-flux conversion efficiencies of 1.0%/mW for generation and 0.5%/mW for detection. It also operates at 4 K in a dilution refrigerator through the same fiber-only optical links. Together, these capabilities establish an all-photonic platform for millimeter-wave-to-terahertz systems and offer a broadly applicable architecture for applications constrained by electrical-interconnect loss, heat load, and footprint.