Selective tuning of optical modes in a silicon comb-like photonic crystal cavity

Abstract

Realizing multiply resonant photonic crystal cavities with large free spectral range is key to achieve integrated devices with highly efficient nonlinear response, such as frequency conversion, four-wave mixing, and parametric oscillation. This task is typically difficult owing to the cavity modes’ sensitivity to fabrication disorder, which makes it hard to reliably achieve a comb-like spectrum of equally spaced modes even when a perfect matching is theoretically predicted. Here we show that a comb-like spectrum of up to eight modes with very high quality factor and diffraction limited volumes can be engineered in the bichromatic-type potential of a two-dimensional photonic crystal cavity fabricated in a thin silicon membrane. To cope with the tight tolerance in terms of frequency spacings and resonance linewidths, we develop a permanent post-processing technique that allows the selective tuning of individual confined modes, thus achieving an almost perfect frequency matching of high Q resonances with record finesse in silicon microresonators. Our experimental results are extremely promising in view of ultra-low power nonlinear photonics in silicon.

Keywords

• photonic crystal cavities
• optical frequency combs
• integrated photonic circuits