Zener tunneling of light waves in an optical superlattice.
We report on the observation of Zener tunneling of light waves in spectral and time-resolved transmission measurements, performed on an optical superlattice made of porous silicon. The structure was designed to have two photonic minibands, spaced by a narrow frequency gap. A gradient in the refractive index was introduced to create two optical Wannier-Stark ladders and, at a critical value of the optical gradient, tunneling between energy bands was observed in the form of an enhanced transmission peak and a characteristic time dependence of the transmission.
Ghulinyan
Mher
M
Department of Physics, University of Trento and INFM, via Sommarive 14, I-38050 Povo (Trento), Italy. mghool@science.unitn.it
Oton
Claudio J
CJ
Gaburro
Zeno
Z
Pavesi
Lorenzo
L
Toninelli
Costanza
C
Wiersma
Diederik S
DS