Photonic crystal waveguide switch with a microelectromechanical actuator

摘要

A photonic crystal waveguide switch with a movable slab is proposed and fabricated by silicon micromachining. The switch structure consists of in-line input and output photonic crystal waveguide slabs and a switching slab to bridge gap between the waveguides. Driving the switching slab with a microelectromechanical actuator, the transmission between the waveguides is modulated. The switching characteristics can be explained by calculations using the finite-difference time-domain method.