Struttura della materia

Localization, coupling and correlation of light waves in two-dimensional disordered photonic systems

by Francesco Riboli (INO-CNR)

Europe/Rome
Aula 6 (Dipartimento di Fisica - Ed. E.Fermi)

Aula 6

Dipartimento di Fisica - Ed. E.Fermi

Description
The ability of disordered systems to diffuse or localize light waves depends on the dimensionality of the system and the “strength” of its structural disorder. While on one hand the possibility of light localization in three-dimensional systems is still an open and lively debated question, localized states have been already observed and well characterized for systems with lower dimensionalities. Two-dimensional disordered systems thus represent the perfect playground for testing theoretical models and investigate novel transport regimes of waves that possibly go beyond the standard picture cast by the self-consistent theory of localization. In this talk I will discuss some key aspects behind light localization in two-dimensional disordered photonic systems. The local density of optical states (LDOS) is characterized by isolated resonances with finite spectral width and finite spatial extent [1]. The spectral and spatial distributions of the LDOS profile can be tuned by changing the average strength of structural disorder, while the mutual coupling between resonances can be selectively modulated by locally engineering the structural disorder [2]. Finally, a statistical study of LDOS spectra is performed by means of correlation spectroscopy techniques and compared to the self-consistent theory of localization. We observe the expected universal renormalization of the Boltzmann diffusion coefficient D/DB, but also non-universal contributions that are sensitive to subwavelength features of the material [3]. [1] F. Riboli et al. “Anderson localization of near-visible light in two dimensions” Opt. Lett. 36, 127-129 (2011). [2] F. Riboli et al. “Engineering of light confinement in strongly scattering disordered media” Nat. Mater. 13, 720 (2014). [3] F. Riboli et al. “Tailoring correlations of the local density of states in disordered photonic materials” arXiv:1609.01975v1 (2016).