The design and fabrication of microdisk resonators for terahertz frequency operation

The design and fabrication of resonators and waveguides, operating at THz frequencies are reported. Resonance frequencies, mode confinement, quality factors, and stop-bands were calculated for resonators with and without photonic elements. The estimations show that very narrow modes can exist within the propagation bandgap of a photonic lattice. Microdisk devices were designed and fabricated for high-quality whispering-gallery modes centered around 10 THz. Combined with silicon-germanium quantum wells grown by molecular beam epitaxy, these resonators are promising candidates for silicon-based miniature far-infrared lasers.