Control of Modes Coupling in Photonic Crystal Waveguides by Introducing Asymmetry and Long Periodicity

The control of modes coupling in photonic crystal waveguides (PCWGs) is quite important because it's the basic working mechanism of many devices in optical integrative circuits, such as filters, switches, optical add drop multiplexers (OADMs), etc. Up to now, the researches of this area mostly focus on the modes coupling between two parallel PCWGs or between PCWGs and resonance cavities. In this paper, we proposed a new way of controlling modes coupling in PCWGs by introducing asymmetry and long periodicity. Because of the presence of asymmetry and long periodicity in PCWGs, some interesting modes coupling phenomena, which used to be forbidden in normal PCWGs, happen. Then a filter with a 1.42 nm full-width at the half value (FWHM) and an OADM with a 1.31 nm FWHM and a 0.34 dB insertion loss have been designed by utilizing the new modes coupling phenomena. Our researches not only provide a new way of controlling modes coupling in PCWGs but also benefit the design of many devices in optical integrative circuits greatly.