Waveguiding at 1550 nm in planar photonic crystal circuits

Summary form only. Planar photonic crystal waveguides and devices may offer the possibility to build photonic circuits with greater density and new functionality compared to existing waveguide devices that are based on the control of light by refraction. The primary vehicles for this research are the study of microcavity lasers as a path to understanding new functionality, and the propagation of light around sharp bends as the path to increasing the packing density of planar optical circuits. We report our results on the successful demonstration of coupling and guiding of light in a planar photonic circuit incorporating sharp bends. Planar waveguide circuits were fabricated in silicon on insulator wafers using electron-beam lithography and chemically-assisted ion beam etching. The target ratio between the hole radius and the period was 0.4. Waveguides were formed by omitting a row of holes in the structure during lithography. The waveguide benefits from optical confinement in the plane of propagation by the photonic crystal and confinement perpendicular to the plane by total internal reflection.