Zener tunneling of light waves in an optical superlattice

We report on the observation of Zener tunneling of light waves in spectral and time-resolved transmission measurements, performed on an optical superlattice made of porous silicon. The structure was designed to have two photonic minibands, spaced by a narrow frequency gap. A gradient in the refracti...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Physical review letters 2005-04, Vol.94 (12), p.127401.1-127401.4, Article 127401
Main Authors: GHULINYAN, Mher, OTON, Claudio J, GABURRO, Zeno, PAVESI, Lorenzo, TONINELLI, Costanza, WIERSMA, Diederik S
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Condensed matter: electronic structure, electrical, magnetic, and optical properties
Exact sciences and technology
Multilayers, superlattices
Optical properties and condensed-matter spectroscopy and other interactions of matter with particles and radiation
Optical properties of low-dimensional, mesoscopic, and nanoscale materials and structures
Physics
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:We report on the observation of Zener tunneling of light waves in spectral and time-resolved transmission measurements, performed on an optical superlattice made of porous silicon. The structure was designed to have two photonic minibands, spaced by a narrow frequency gap. A gradient in the refractive index was introduced to create two optical Wannier-Stark ladders and, at a critical value of the optical gradient, tunneling between energy bands was observed in the form of an enhanced transmission peak and a characteristic time dependence of the transmission.
ISSN:0031-9007
1079-7114
DOI:10.1103/PhysRevLett.94.127401