# Design and control of mode interaction in coupled ZnTe optical microcavities

## TL;DR

This paper demonstrates the design, fabrication, and characterization of coupled ZnTe optical microcavities, enabling tunable mode interactions for advanced photonic applications.

## Contribution

It introduces a novel approach to coupling multiple ZnTe microcavities with controllable interaction strength using transfer matrix calculations and molecular beam epitaxy.

## Key findings

- Coupling strength can be tuned by adjusting cavity separation and micropillar size.
- Experimental results agree with tight-binding model calculations.
- Efficient fabrication of coupled microcavities demonstrated.

## Abstract

The photonics involving II-VI epitaxial layers was limited so far to structures based on a single planar microcavity. Here, we present double, vertically coupled, ZnTe optical microcavities in planar and 3-D photonic molecule geometry. We design the structures with the help of transfer matrix method calculations and we establish their fabrication technology by molecular beam epitaxy. We characterize the samples by reflectivity spatial mapping and study them by measurements of angle-integrated and angle-resolved photoluminescence and reflectivity. We efficiently tailor the interaction strength of the cavities optical modes by an adjustment of the spatial separation between the microcavities, their thickness ratio and by the size of micropillars etched out of the planar structure. Coupling constants extracted from our measurements agree well with those determined in calculations in the frame of a tight-binding approach applied to one-dimensional photonic structures.