Optical Fiber Telecommunications Volume VIA, 6th Edition

Chapter 4

Fundamentals of Photonic Crystals for Telecom Applications—Photonic Crystal Lasers

Susumu Noda,    Department of Electronic Science and Engineering, Kyoto University, Kyoto 615-8510, Japan

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the faculty members, research staff and students at Noda’s Quantum Optoelectronics Laboratory, Kyoto University.

4.1 Introduction

Photonic crystals are optical nanostructures with refractive indices that vary periodically, and are characterized by a photonic bandgap in terms of the energy of photons. Light with wavelengths that lie in the photonic bandgap cannot exist in the crystal, giving rise to completely different optical phenomena than in free space. These characteristics enable various interesting methods of optical ...