Increasing THz Radiation Power and Monochromaticity Using Optically Induced Photonic Crystal in Layered Superconductors

TL;DR

This paper proposes using optically induced photonic crystals in layered superconductors to significantly boost terahertz radiation power and monochromaticity by creating photonic band gaps that improve impedance matching and suppress unwanted harmonics.

Contribution

It introduces a novel method of enhancing THz radiation by optically inducing photonic crystals in layered superconductors, improving power and spectral purity.

Findings

Enhanced radiation power due to photonic band gap formation

Improved impedance matching at the cavity boundary

Attenuation of undesired harmonics

Abstract

The possibility of enhancing the radiation power and monochromaticity by optically induced photonic crystal in the superconducting cavity is proposed and investigated. In such a structure, by periodically irradiating the stacked Josephson junctions and consequently partially suppression of the superconductivity in the irradiated positions due to depairing, a periodic optical configuration is formed. This leads to photonic band gap opening in the range of the terahertz radiation emitted from the layered superconductor. We show that such a photonic band gap significantly enhances the impedance matching at the boundary of the cavity and the waveguide. Since the weak optical coupling of the outer and inner space of layered superconductor samples is a serious reason of reducing radiated power especially in the experiments, the proposed configuration is capable of extremely enhancement in the emitted power along with attenuation of the undesired harmonics.