Extremely low-loss terahertz waveguide based on silicon photonic-crystal slab

Abstract

We pursued the extremely low loss of photonic-crystal waveguides composed of a silicon slab with high resistivity (20 kΩ-cm) in the terahertz region. Propagation and bending losses as small as <0.1 dB/cm (0.326-0.331 THz) and 0.2 dB/bend (0.323-0.331 THz), respectively, were achieved in the 0.3-THz band. We also developed 1.5-Gbit/s terahertz links and demonstrated an error-free uncompressed high-definition video transmission by using a photonic-crystal waveguide with a length of as long as 50 cm and up to 28 bends thanks to the low-loss properties. Our results show the potential of photonic crystals for application as terahertz integration platforms.