Emulation of Propagation in Layered Anisotropic Media With Equivalent Coupled Microstrip Lines

A microstrip transmission line model is proposed for a new class of photonic crystals which exhibit a degenerate band edge (DBE). The microstrip line model is formed from a pair of coupled and uncoupled lines (one per field component, E
_x
and E
_y
) and is the first (to our knowledge) representing propagation within an anisotropic layered medium. Using the standard scattering matrix representation for the three consecutive layer sections forming the DBE unit cell, we calculate the band diagram and show that the periodic microstrip structure supports a DBE mode for a specific fabricatable design