We demonstrate a method to locally change the refractive index in planar optical devices by photodarkening of a thin chalcogenide glass layer deposited on top of the device. The method is used to tune the resonance of GaAs-based photonic crystal cavities by up to 3 nm at 940 nm, with only 5% deterioration in cavity quality factor. The method has broad applications for postproduction tuning of photonic devices.
We present a method to control the resonant coupling interaction in a coupled-cavity photonic crystal molecule by using a local and reversible photochromic tuning technique. We demonstrate the ability to tune both a two-cavity and a three-cavity photonic crystal molecule through the resonance condition by selectively tuning the individual cavities. Using this technique, we can quantitatively determine important parameters of the coupled-cavity system such as the photon tunneling rate. This method can be scaled to photonic crystal molecules with larger numbers of cavities, which provides a versatile method for studying strong interactions in coupled resonator arrays.
We demonstrate a new photo-induced oxidation technique for tuning GaAs photonic crystal cavities using a $390~mathrm{nm}$ pulsed laser with an average power of $10~mathrm{mu W}$. The laser oxidizes a small $left(sim 500~mathrm{nm}right)$ diameter spot, reducing the local index of refraction and blueshifting the cavity. The tuning progress can be actively monitored in real time. We also demonstrate tuning an individual cavity within a pair of proximity-coupled cavities, showing that this method can be used to correct undesired frequency shifts caused by fabrication imperfections in cavity arrays.
We perform spatially dependent tuning of a GaInP photonic crystal cavity using a continuous wave violet laser. Local tuning is obtained by laser heating of the photonic crystal membrane. The cavity resonance shift is measured for different pump positions and for two ambient gases: helium and nitrogen. We find that the width of the temperature profile induced in the membrane depends strongly on the thermal conductivity of the ambient gas. For He gas a narrow spatial width of the temperature profile of 2.8 um is predicted and verified in experiment.
The zero-phonon transition rate of a nitrogen-vacancy center is enhanced by a factor of ~70 by coupling to a photonic crystal resonator fabricated in monocrystalline diamond using standard semiconductor fabrication techniques. Photon correlation measurements on the spectrally filtered zero-phonon line show antibunching, a signature that the collected photoluminescence is emitted primarily by a single nitrogen-vacancy center. The linewidth of the coupled nitrogen-vacancy center and the spectral diffusion are characterized using high-resolution photoluminescence and photoluminescence excitation spectroscopy.
We describe the design, fabrication, and spectroscopy of coupled, high Quality (Q) factor silicon nanobeam photonic crystal cavities. We show that the single nanobeam cavity modes are coupled into even and odd superposition modes, and we simulate the frequency and Q factor as a function of nanobeam spacing, demonstrating that a differential wavelength shift of 70 nm between the two modes is possible while maintaining Q factors greater than 10^6. For both on-substrate and free-standing nanobeams, we experimentally monitor the response of the even mode as the gap is varied, and measure Q factors as high as 200,000.