Better than the effective index method: improved simulation of photonic crystal waveguides

The effective index method (EIM) is commonly used during the simulation of photonic devices, reducing a 3D problem to 2D one. We show that it is not appropriate for the accurate description of Photonic crystal (PhC) waveguides and introduce an alternative approach. Our effective period method provides a more accurate estimation of all waveguide performance metrics (operating wavelength, group index and propagation loss) while maintaining the same reduction in computation load as the EIM.