Effect of point defects on band-gap properties in diamond structure photonic crystals

Abstract

Three dimensional diamond structure photonic crystals (PCs) with point defects fabricated by rapid prototyping and gel casting with alumina were studied at microwave frequencies. The sphere, ellipsoid, and cylinder point defects were introduced in the PCs first and it was found that the localization of electromagnetic wave is the strongest in ellipsoid point defect photonic crystals. Then, the size change of the ellipsoid point defect was studied to find out the optimal size. When the size of the ellipsoid point defect is close to one unit cell, the Q factor, which represents the localization intensity of the electromagnetic wave, will be the biggest. Based on the optimal size of ellipsoid point defect, more ellipsoid point defects were introduced into one diamond PC structure. Three point defect resonant modes were found in a photonic crystal with three ellipsoid point defects and the distance between each defect was twice of the lattice constant. A guided band was observed in the forbidden band gap in a photonic crystal with five ellipsoid point defects, in which the distance between each defect was of one lattice constant. © 2012 American Institute of Physics.