Negative Index Photonic Crystals Superlattices and Zero Phase Delay Lines"

An intense interest in negative index metamaterials (NIMs) [1-2] has been witnessed over the last years. Metal based NIMs [3-11] have been demonstrated at both microwave and infrared frequencies with a motivation mainly coming from the unusual physical properties and potential use in many technological applications [12-21]; however, they usually have large optical losses in their metallic components. As an alternative, dielectric based photonic crystals (PhCs) have been shown to emulate the basic physical properties of NIMs [22-26] and, in addition, have relatively small absorption loss at optical frequencies. Equally important, PhCs can be nanofabricated using currently available silicon chip-scale foundry processing, allowing significant potential in the development of future electronic-photonic integrated circuits.