Grating | EPFL Graph Search

A grating is any regularly spaced collection of essentially identical, parallel, elongated elements. Gratings usually consist of a single set of elongated elements, but can consist of two sets, in which case the second set is usually perpendicular to the first (as illustrated). When the two sets are perpendicular, this is also known as a wikt:grid (as in grid paper) or a mesh. As filters A grating covering a drain (as illustrated) can be a collection of iron bars (the identical, elongated elements) held together (to ensure the bars are parallel and regularly spaced) by a lighter iron frame. Gratings over drains and air vents are used as filters, to block movement of large solids (e.g. people) and to allow movement of liquids. A register is a type of grating used in heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, which transmits air, while stopping solid objects. File:Vindobona Hoher Markt-71.JPG|Grating - drain cover, [[ancient Roman architecture]] at [[Vindobona]], [[Austri

Accurate, Stable and Efficient Modal Calculations of Photoelectrically Useful Absorption in Lamellar Metallic and Semiconductor Diffraction Gratings

David Isaak Gablinger

Solar energy has seen tremendous advances in the past years. For thin film photovoltaics, which use less of the expensive semiconductor materials, insufficient light absorption can be a limiting factor. It is hoped that by using diffractive optics to improve the light absorption, the cost per Watt could sink. Correspondingly, the optics of such structures need to compensate for the low absorption by high (structural) resonance, which is challenging to calculate. To estimate optimal structures, a numerical method should be able to assess feasible structures with widely varying geometries quickly. Modal methods allow for an efficient analysis of structures with varying height through the separation of eigenvalue and boundary value problem. First, the thesis aspires to further develop the modal methods for the calculation of optical properties of layered structures containing weakly absorbing metals and semiconductors. Second, the thesis aims to calculate absorption enhancements in idealized, prototypical structures by applying the newly developed methods. The calculations should only depend on material parameters and not contain additional assumptions. These absorption enhancements are not tied to a priori assumptions such as mode couplings, but they solely follow the physics of the structure investigated. The first part of the thesis is concerned with the methodical improvements. A first emphasis is put on studying peculiar properties of the eigenvalue problem, and on new developments of methods to solve it within a layer. Furthermore, it shows several variants for the numerical implementation of the eigenvalue problem. This part includes a new method to calculate the eigenvalues that can be adapted to two dimensional grating problems of arbitrary shape. The new method integrates the eigenvalue problem by making use of a two point trapezoidal formula, and satisfies the boundary condition between different materials exactly. It is energy conserving and the rate of convergence depends on the approximation order. The eigenvalues show a monotonic convergence that allows for extrapolation. The second methodical emphasis is placed on variants of the implementation of the boundary value problem that connects the grating to the incoming and outgoing plane waves. This algorithm describes the propagation of the incident energy to the semiconductor layer and the substrate by solving a non-recursive and numerically stable system of linear equations. A novel variant reduces the bandwidth of the corresponding matrix by a third. The third part of the thesis concerns calculations using the improved methods. First, the improved calculations are verified by showing that the energy conservation of the modal method, as well as the well-behavedness of the condition number of the calculation. Next, numerical results for the new methods are compared to results from the literature for analytic modal methods, and a comparison with existing software is made. Thereafter, the interface plasmons occuring for H polarization are investigated. In the last part of the thesis, calculations are made for the material specific absorption of light in metallic gratings covered by semiconductors, with a special interest in the absorption in the semiconductor. Here, the spectra for rectangular, sinusoidal gratings, and asymmetric gratings are calculated, and the absorption improvement is investigated through an analysis of the involved modes.

EPFL2016

Polymer multilayer photonic micro- and nanostructures with tailored spectral properties

Amazing and beautiful optical effects are present in Nature. Some examples are the iridescent colors produced by peacocks, butterflies and beetles. While the simulations of some of these structures have already been realized, only a few elements have been fabricated. We are interested to understand and to reproduce some of these amazing optical properties. Applications such as security or decorative elements in different fields like jewelery or horology can be imagined. SEM pictures of the structure of these animals show a frequent combination of periodic or pseudo-periodic elements such as interference filters, multilayer reflectors, microlenses and gratings. The different elements combine angular and spectral effects. This combination enables strong optical effects for a large range of viewing angles and spectra. Different technologies such as standard photolithography, recording of interference patterns, transfer of photoresist structures in glass substrates, replications, hot embossing and spincoating were used to fabricate a variety of optical elements. The fabricated elements were produced with polymer materials because of their ease of use, and the possibility to build multilevel structures with replication methods. A drawback is the small refractive index difference possible between polymers and compared to air. In the first part, different combinations of polymer micro- and nano-optical elements such as corrugated gratings, multilayer Bragg reflectors, microlens arrays, micro-prisms arrays and diffusers were successfully fabricated. Poly (vinyl alcohol) and poly (N-vinycarbazole) with refractive indices of 1.56 and 1.72, respectively, at a wavelength of 500nm were used to fabricate the polymer multilayer reflectors. The micro-optical elements used were: microlenses with diameter between 32 μm and 250 μm and around 20 μm height; prisms with 50 μm period and 25 μm height. The angularly dependent reflectivity of the different fabricated elements was studied. Thanks to the close combination of diffractive, refractive and reflective micro- and nano-optical elements, non-standard artificial visual color effects were produced. The fabricated elements were modeled with different tools according to the dimensions of the different optical elements. Ray tracing analysis was used in the case with micro-optical elements while the Fourier modal method permitted simulation of the interaction of the light with the periodic nano-structures. The specific effects of the variation of the different parameters were highlighted, the basic principles and the limitation of the polymer technology were identified. In the second part, the optical modeling tools and the fabrication technologies developed were used to model and fabricate polymer light emitting diodes in a distributed feedback regime. The optical properties of the different layers were modeled and the physical dimensions of elements with active conductive polymers me-LPPP and F8 were calculated, fabricated and tested. The sensitive dimensions and parameters were underlined. Polymer materials permitted rapid fabrication of complex and innovative optical elements with very simple technologies like spin-coating and replication methods. These technologies allow the combination of nano-optical elements with dimensions of the order of a hundred nanometers with micro-optical elements with dimension of the order of about ten to one hundred microns.

Institut de Microtechnique, Université de Neuchâtel2008

Light-controlled reconfigurable fiber bragg gratings written in attenuation fiber

Rodrigue Chatton, Dragan Coric, Hans Georg Limberger, Yari Luchessa, René Salathé

A novel type of light controlled fiber Bragg gratings written in attenuation fiber is demonstrated. The spectral reconfiguration can be controlled by the pump power, the pumping configuration, the grating position and the fiber attenuation. © Optical Society of America.

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Computer Society2007

Polymer multilayer photonic micro- and nanostructures with tailored spectral properties

Institut de Microtechnique, Université de Neuchâtel2008

Accurate, Stable and Efficient Modal Calculations of Photoelectrically Useful Absorption in Lamellar Metallic and Semiconductor Diffraction Gratings

David Isaak Gablinger

EPFL2016