Open AccessGaAs-based air-slot photonic crystal nanocavity for optomechanical oscillators
Author(s) -
Masahiro Nomura
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
optics express
Language(s) - Uncategorized
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.394
H-Index - 271
ISSN - 1094-4087
DOI - 10.1364/oe.20.005204
Subject(s) - photonic crystal , optics , q factor , materials science , optoelectronics , resonance (particle physics) , electric field , dielectric , coupling (piping) , wavelength , mode volume , resonator , physics , fiber optic sensor , particle physics , quantum mechanics , optical fiber , metallurgy , graded index fiber
We theoretically investigate an optomechanical structure consisting of two parallel GaAs membranes with an air-slot type photonic crystal nanocavity. The optical cavity has a quality factor of 4.8 × 10 6 at 1.52 μm and an extremely small modal volume of 0.015 of a cubic wavelength for the fundamental mode in a vacuum. The localized electric field near the air/dielectric-object boundary provides a large optomechanical coupling factor of ~990 GHz/nm. The fundamental mechanical mode resonance is 95 MHz and a quality factor is 83,800 at room temperature, nearly seven times higher than that for a similar Si-based structure. This high mechanical quality factor of a GaAs-based structure stems from low thermoelastic loss and leads to more effective optical control of nanomechanical oscillators.