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Uses of photonic crystal microcavities to enhance light-matter interactions in silicon photonic circuits

Abstract:

Silicon photonic circuitry is rapidly becoming a powerful "commodity" for miniature sensor arrays, datacom processors, and as a testbed for scalable quantum information processors.  Our group has made use of photonic crystal based microcavities in silicon photonic circuits in order to enhance the coupling strength of nanoscale electronic materials with the ~ 1.5 micron wavelength photons carried in these circuits.  I will discuss three examples; i) optical trapping and characterization of single Au nanoparticles using microwatts of infrared CW laser power [1], ii) near unity efficiency single photon superconducting nanowire detectors [2], and iii) single photon emitters [3].

1.  Mirsadeghi, S. H., and Young, J.F., “Ultrasensitive Diagnostic Analysis of Au Nanoparticles Optically Trapped in Silicon Photonic Circuits at Sub-Milliwatt Powers”, Nano Letters dx.doi.org/10.1021/nl501424d , Nano Lett., 2014, 14 (9), pp 5004–5009 (2014).

2.  Mohsen K. Akhlaghi, Ellen Schelew and Jeff F. Young, “Waveguide integrated superconducting single-photon detectors implemented as near-perfect absorbers of coherent radiation”, Nature Communications, 6:2041-1723 (2015).

3.  Charles A. Foell, Ellen Schelew, Haijun Qiao, Keith A. Abel, Stephen Hughes, Frank C. J. M. van Veggel, and Jeff F. Young, “Saturation behaviour of colloidal PbSe quantum dot exciton  emission coupled into silicon photonic circuits”, Opt. Exp. 20, 10453, (2012).

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