AVS 53rd International Symposium
    Advanced Surface Engineering Wednesday Sessions
       Session SE1-WeA

Paper SE1-WeA3
Fabrication and Characterization of Square Spiral Photonic Crystals Made by Glancing Angle Deposition

Wednesday, November 15, 2006, 2:40 pm, Room 2007

Session: Glancing Angle Deposition
Presenter: M.A. Summers, University of Alberta, Canada
Authors: M.A. Summers, University of Alberta, Canada
M.O. Jensen, University of Alberta, Canada
M.J. Brett, University of Alberta, Canada
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The square spiral architecture is a promising candidate for photonic band gap (PBG) materials due to its ease of fabrication. The silicon square spiral structure is predicted to yield an optimum PBG width of 15% relative to the gap center frequency and can be fabricated using the glancing angle deposition (GLAD) technique. The GLAD fabrication process uses controlled substrate motion and highly oblique deposition to engineer precise architectures on the nanometer size scale. These nanostructures are grown with lateral and longitudinal periodicity using a pre-patterned substrate consisting of a tetragonal array of relief structures that can be fabricated using a number of lithographic techniques. Photolithography offers the possibility of large-scale manufacturability, while techniques such as laser direct-write lithography and electron-beam lithography provide the significant advantage of easy parameter modification and defect inclusion since no master is required. The GLAD process enables the scaling down of photonic crystal dimensions throughout the near infra-red wavelength region. Additionally, the versatility of the GLAD process enables the fabrication of a 3D-2D-3D photonic crystal hetero-structure, providing a foundation for potential use in optical networking applications. We report the structural and optical characterization of various silicon square-spiral photonic crystal structures fabricated using the GLAD technique.