Coupled defects in one-dimensional photonic crystal films fabricated with glancing angle deposition

This work presents the successful fabrication of 1D photonic crystals (PCs) with two defects using the glancing angle deposition (GLAD) technique. We study the coupling behavior of the two PC defects and demonstrate the ability to control the defect interaction. GLAD allows engineering of film nanostructure to produce PCs with sinusoidal refractive index variation through control of film nanostructure and porosity. Two phase-shift defects are introduced into the refractive index profile of the film. The observed defect-defect coupling is explained by a coupled-oscillator model and the interaction strength is found to decrease exponentially with increasing defect separation. Furthermore, the results demonstrate the promise of GLAD as a platform technology for PC research and device fabrication.