Light Waves in Thin Films and Integrated Optics

Abstract

Integrated optics is a far-reaching attempt to apply thin-film technology to optical circuits and devices, and, by using methods of integrated circuitry, to achieve a better and more economical optical system. The specific topics discussed here are physics of light waves in thin films, materials and losses involved, methods of couplings light beam into and out of a thin film, and nonlinear interactions in waveguide structures. The purpose of this paper is to review in some detail the important development of this new and fascinating field, and to caution the reader that the technology involved is difficult because of the smallness and perfection demanded by thin-film optical devices.

Surface plasmon resonance-enhanced light interaction in an integrated ormocomp nanowire

“…The attenuation loss of nanowires can be due to volume absorption and surface scattering (Tien 1971). The polymer nanowires examined in earlier work (Viphavakit et al 2014a), with dimensions similar to those of the structures presented in this paper, exhibited surface scattering, caused by the surface roughness which has been considered as the dominant factor to enhance the evanescent fields and the sensitivity.…”

Guided mode studies of liquid crystal layers

“…Accompanying this development of optical fibre technology light guiding in thin films and layered structures has also received considerable attention both for integrated optics and other applications. During these developments a new optical probing technique, the guided mode technique [5,6], for investigating the optical index profiles in guiding structures has materialised. This technique utilises the fact that a series of discrete (quantised waveguide momentum) modes may be excited in thin films or fibres, their mode spectrum being dependent upon the refractive index distribution in, and the dimensions of, the structure.…”

“…A ray optics picture is first used here to describe the optical modes [5] propagating in the planar waveguide. The situation to be considered is that of a plane wave of radiation, with an incident angle β (angle between the wavefront normal and the normal to the boundary of the geometry) to the interface, propagating inside the guiding layer as shown in Figure 16 When β s < β < π/2 the light is primarily contained inside the guiding layer by total internal reflection at both the top and bottom boundaries.…”

“…In addition more modes can also be excited for shorter probing wavelengths of the incident light unless there is very strong optical dispersion of the guide indices with wavelength. Further details of optical waveguide theory and technology may be found in a range of review articles and books [5,6].…”

Wet Chemical Etching of Pb(ZrTi)O 3 Ferroelectric Thin Films for Optical Waveguide Application

“…The latter allows to determine the refractive index and the thickness of the PZT films [6,7,8]. The M-lines technique is based on the use of a prism of refractive index higher than that of the PZT (in our case ZnSe) which is pressed on the thin film (see Fig.…”