The Role of Short-Range Order and Hyperuniformity in the Formation of Band Gaps in Disordered Photonic Materials

TL;DR

This paper investigates how short-range order and hyperuniformity influence the formation of photonic band gaps in disordered materials, highlighting the importance of structural correlations for designing disordered photonic bandgap materials.

Contribution

It demonstrates that controlling short-range order and hyperuniformity can effectively tune photonic band gaps in disordered structures, providing new insights for material design.

Findings

Band gaps exist for all polarizations in disordered high-index materials.

Band gap width increases with positional correlation, short-range order, and hyperuniformity.

Optimizing Bragg scattering at the isotropic Brillouin zone is crucial for designing disordered PBG materials.

Abstract

We study photonic band gap formation in two-dimensional high refractive index disordered materials where the dielectric structure is derived from packing disks in real and reciprocal space. Numerical calculations of the photonic density of states demonstrate the presence of a band gap for all polarizations in both cases. We find that the band gap width is controlled by the increase in positional correlation inducing short-range order and hyperuniformity concurrently. Our findings suggest that the optimization of short-range order, in particular the tailoring of Bragg scattering at the isotropic Brillouin zone, are of key importance for designing disordered PBG materials.