Confining Light in the NM Scale

在纳米尺度上限制光康奈尔大学Michal Lipson的智慧价值：在芯片尺度上展示耗电极少且体积小的新型高效光发射器一直是科学界的目标。这类器件需要使用光子结构，如光子晶体，这种结构通过重新分布光子态密度，将光限制在小维度上，并在特定方向上增强光发射。这种结构的尺寸通常被限制在光波长的数量级，这反过来又导致光发射效率的有限增强，与限制程度成正比。在这里，建议通过实验演示极低的光学模式体积来消除对光限制程度的限制。将光的限制提高到远远超过传统光子结构所达到的水平的能力，有可能增加光发射和调制。更广泛的影响：通过研究用于增加光发射的强光限制结构所获得的基本知识，对于可在芯片规模上大规模集成的各种新应用，如放大、传感、激光和开关，具有直接重要性。作为教育努力的一部分，建议制定一项教育方案，使学生接触光子学，作为一个跨学科领域，并加强光子学领域的本科生和研究生电气和计算机工程课程。将为本科生和研究生举办一系列跨学科研讨会，并将在康奈尔大学欧洲经委会系的两个课程中通过讲座和实验室介绍光子学的新主题。

Confining Light in the Nanometer ScaleMichal Lipson, Cornell University0601460Intellectual Merit:The demonstration of novel efficient light emitters that consume very little power and are small in size on a chip-scale has been a goal of the scientific community. Such devices require the use of photonic structures, such as photonic crystals, which confine light in small dimensions and enhance light emission in specific directions through redistribution of the photonic density of states. Such structures are usually limited in size to the order of the wavelength of light, which in turn induces a limited enhancement of the light emission efficiency, proportional to the degree of confinement. Here it is proposed to remove this limitation on the degree of light confinement by demonstrating extremely low optical modal volumes experimentally. The ability to increase the confinement of light well beyond the levels achieved with traditional photonic structures has the potential for increased light emission as well as modulation. Broader Impacts:The fundamental knowledge gained by studying strong light confining structures for increased light emission has direct importance for a wide variety of novel applications such as amplification, sensing, lasing and switching that can be massively integrated on a chip-scale. As part of the educational effort it is proposed to develop an educational program for exposing students to photonics as an interdisciplinary area and enhancing the undergraduate and graduate Electrical and Computer Engineering curriculum in the area of photonics. An interdisciplinary seminar series will be developed for undergraduate and graduate students, and novel subjects of photonics will be introduced through lectures and laboratories in two courses in the ECE department at Cornell University.