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Electronic control of optical Anderson localization modes

Nature Nanotechnology volume 9, pages 365–371 (2014)Cite this article

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Abstract

Anderson localization of light has been demonstrated in a few different dielectric materials and lithographically fabricated structures. However, such localization is difficult to control, and requires strong magnetic fields or nonlinear optical effects, and electronic control has not been demonstrated. Here, we show control of optical Anderson localization using charge carriers injected into more than 100 submicrometre-scale p–n diodes. The diodes are embedded into the cross-section of the optical waveguide and are fabricated with a technology compatible with the current electronics industry. Large variations in the output signal, exceeding a factor of 100, were measured with 1 V and a control current of 1 mA. The transverse footprint of our device is only 0.125 µm2, about five orders of magnitude smaller than optical two-dimensional lattices. Whereas all-electronic localization has a narrow usable bandwidth, electronically controlled optical localization can access more than a gigahertz of bandwidth and creates new possibilities for controlling localization at radiofrequencies, which can benefit applications such as random lasers, optical limiters, imagers, quantum optics and measurement devices.

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Figure 1: Coupled oscillators.
Figure 2: Optical device and electronic control.
Figure 3: Spectrally resolved infrared imaging of modes.
Figure 4: On and off states of the localized mode.
Figure 5: Switching waveform of localization.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank J.B. Pendry, D. Wiersma, P. Lodahl, C. Lopez, Y. Vlasov and H. Cao for discussions. This work was supported by the US National Science Foundation (grants ECCS 092539, 1028553, 1153716 and 1201308) and the Center for Integrated Access Networks—a National Science Foundation Engineering Research Center. J.R.O. acknowledges support from the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), Singapore. All statements of fact, opinion or conclusions contained herein are those of the authors and should not be construed as representing the official views or policies of the US Government.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, 92093-0407, California, USA

    Shayan Mookherjea & Jun Rong Ong

  2. Institute of Microelectronics, A*STAR (Agency for Science, Technology and Research), 11 Science Park Road, Science Park II, 117685, Singapore

    Xianshu Luo & Lo Guo-Qiang

Authors
  1. Shayan Mookherjea
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  2. Jun Rong Ong
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  4. Lo Guo-Qiang
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Contributions

S.M. conceived the study, coordinated the project and wrote the manuscript with input from all authors. J.R.O. designed the lithographic layout for the devices, which were fabricated by X.L. and L.G.Q. Measurements were performed by S.M. and J.R.O. All authors reviewed the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Shayan Mookherjea.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Mookherjea, S., Ong, J., Luo, X. et al. Electronic control of optical Anderson localization modes. Nature Nanotech 9, 365–371 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2014.53

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