0000000000433288
AUTHOR
Clivia M. Sotomayor Torres
Self-assembled three-dimensional inverted photonic crystals on a photonic chip
Three dimensional photonic crystals (PhCs) exhibiting a full photonic band gap have high potential in optical signal processing and detector applications. However, the challenges in the integration of the 3D PhCs into photonic circuits have so far hindered their exploitation in real devices. This article demonstrates the fabrication of 3D PhCs exploiting the capillary directed self-assembly (CDSA) of monodisperse colloidal silica spheres, their inversion to silicon shells, and integration with silicon waveguides. The measured transmission characteristics agree with numerical predictions and provide strong indication of a full photonic band gap in the inverted 3D photonic crystals at wavelen…
Noise-Assisted Crystallization of Opal Films
International audience; An improvement of the crystal quality of opal fi lms self-assembled from polymer spheres in a moving meniscus using the agitation by white noise acoustic vibrations is demonstrated. A tenfold higher ordering of a hexagonal sphere packing in the (111) plane is achieved. This crystallization method, the mechanism of which is described in terms of the stochastic resonance, is a contrast to the widely used approach based on maintaining equilibrium conditions during the crystallization process. The precise quantifi cation of the incremental lattice order improvement as a function of acoustic noise intensity is achieved by calculating the probability of finding an opposite…
Crystallization of silica opals onto patterned silicon wafer
We report on fabrication of high quality opaline photonic crystals from large silica spheres, self-assembled in hydrophilic trenches of silicon wafers by using a drawing apparatus with a combination of stirring. The achievements here reported comprise a spatial selectivity of opal crystallization without special treatment of the wafer surface, a filling of the trenches up to the top, leading to a spatially uniform film thickness, particularly an absence of cracks within the size of the trenches, and finally a good three-dimensional order of the opal lattice even in trenches with a complex confined geometry, verified using optical measurements. The opal lattice was found to match the pattern…
Propagation and scattering of light in opal heterojunctions
The directionality of the polarised light transmission has been studied in heterogeneous photonic crystals based on double-film opal in comparison to homogeneous crystals on single-film opals. In spite of additional scattering at the photonic bandgap interface, ballistic propagation has been preserved. Changes of the polarisation anisotropy in hetero-opal compared to homogeneous opal have been assigned to specific mode matching conditions at the photonic bandgap interface.
Artificially inscribed defects in opal photonic crystals
Opals are three-dimensional photonic crystals, self-assembled from dielectric spherical beads into a face-centered cubic lattice. By introducing intentional defects in the crystal lattice, one modifies features such as spontaneous emission and the directionality of diffracted light. We here present a method for the artificial introduction of a lattice of such intentional defects in self-assembled poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) photonic crystals by means of electron beam lithography. The inscribed defects are of the size of an individual bead, providing a broad spectral range between adjacent resonance peaks. This opens for devices with single line transmission in the photonic band gap, as…