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Updated: Jul 30, 2026

Fabrication And Characterization Of Photonic Crystal Slow Light Waveguides And Cavities
Published on: November 30, 2012
Photon BLOCH oscillations in porous silicon optical superlattices
V Agarwal1, J A del Río, G Malpuech
1Centro de Investigacion en Ingenieria y Ciencias Applicadas UAEM, Avenida Universidad 1001, Colonia Chamilpa, CP 62210, Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico.
Abstract:
We report the first observation of oscillations of the electromagnetic field in an optical superlattice based on porous silicon. These oscillations are an optical equivalent of well-known electronic Bloch oscillations in crystals. Elementary cells of our structure are composed by microcavities whose coupling gives rise to the extended collective modes forming optical minigaps and minibands. By varying thicknesses of the cavities along the structure axis, we have created an effective electric field for photons. A very high quality factor of the confined optical state of the Wannier-Stark ladder may allow lasing in porous silicon-based superlattices.

