Electromagnetic topological chiral edge states mimicking the quantum Hall effect have attracted a great deal of attention due to their unique features of free backscattering and immunity against sharp bends and defects. However, the matching techniques between classical waveguides and the topological one-way waveguide deserve more attention for real-world applications. In this paper, a highly efficient conversion structure between a classical rectangular waveguide and a topological one-way waveguide is proposed and demonstrated at the microwave frequency, which efficiently converts classical guided waves to topological one-way edge states. A tapered transition is designed to match both the momentum and impedance of the classical guided waves and the topological one-way edge states. With the conversion structure, the waves generated by a point excitation source can be coupled to the topological one-way waveguide with very high coupling efficiency, which can ensure high transmission of the whole system (i.e., from the source and the receiver). Simulation and measurement results demonstrate the proposed method. This investigation is beneficial to the applications of topological one-way waveguides and opens up a new avenue for advanced topological and classical integrated functional devices and systems.

The idea of a slot waveguide amplifier based on erbium-doped tellurite glass is first theoretically discussed in this work. Choosing the horizontal slot for low propagation loss, the TM mode profile compressed in the insertion layer was simulated, and the gain characteristics of the slot waveguide amplifier were calculated. Combining the capacity to confine light locally and the merits of tellurite glass as an emission host, this optimized amplifier shows enhanced interactions between the electric field and erbium ions and achieves a net gain of 15.21 dB for the 0.01 mW input light at 1530 nm, implying great promise of a high-performance device.

Plasmonic waveguides, as a competitive candidate, have been widely studied in rapid developing photonic integrated circuits (PICs) and optical interconnection fields. However, crosstalk between plasmonic waveguides is a critical issue that has to be considered in practice. Actually, crosstalk dominates the ultimate integration density of the planar photonic circuits. This paper reviews the recent research work on evaluation methods and crosstalk suppression approaches of plasmonic waveguides. Three crosstalk evaluation methods based on comparison of specific parameters of waveguides have been summarized. Furthermore, four specific approaches to reduce crosstalk have been illustrated as two categories according to their impacts on waveguide performances and the whole circuit. One means of crosstalk suppression is changing the placement of waveguides, which could maintain the transmission characteristics of the original waveguide. The other means is inserting medium, which has the advantage of occupying smaller space compared to the first method. Consequently, to suppress crosstalk between plasmonic waveguides, one should choose suitable approach.

Parity–time (PT) symmetry has been demonstrated in the frame of classic optics. Its applications in laser science have resulted in unconventional control and manipulation of resonant modes. PT-symmetric periodic circular Bragg lasers were previously proposed. Analyses with a transfer-matrix method have shown their superior properties of reduced threshold and enhanced modal discrimination between the radial modes. However, the properties of the azimuthal modes were not analyzed, which restricts further development of circular Bragg lasers. Here, we adopt the coupled-mode theory to design and analyze chirped circular Bragg lasers with radial PT symmetry. The new structures possess more versatile modal control with further enhanced modal discrimination between the azimuthal modes. We also analyze azimuthally modulated circular Bragg lasers with radial PT symmetry, which are shown to achieve even higher modal discrimination.

In this work, we first discuss systematically three general approaches to construct a non-Hermitian flat band, defined by its dispersionless real part. These approaches resort to, respectively, spontaneous restoration of non-Hermitian particle-hole symmetry, a persisting flat band from the underlying Hermitian system, and a compact Wannier function that is an eigenstate of the entire system. For the last approach in particular, we show the simplest lattice structure where it can be applied, and we further identify a special case of such a flat band where every point in the Brillouin zone is an exceptional point of order 3. A localized excitation in this “EP3 flat band” can display either a conserved power, quadratic power increase, or even quartic power increase, depending on whether the localized eigenstate or one of the two generalized eigenvectors is initially excited. Nevertheless, the asymptotic wave function in the long time limit is always given by the eigenstate, in this case, the compact Wannier function or its superposition in two or more unit cells.

Hybrid plasmonic waveguides leveraging the coupling between dielectric modes and plasmon polaritons have emerged as a major focus of research attention during the past decade. A feasible way for constructing practical hybrid plasmonic structures is to integrate metallic configurations with silicon-on-insulator waveguiding platforms. Here we report a transformative high-performance silicon-based hybrid plasmonic waveguide that consists of a silicon nano-rib loaded with a metallic nanowire. A deep-subwavelength mode area (λ2/4.5×105 λ2/7×103), in conjunction with a reasonable propagation distance (2.2–60.2 μm), is achievable at a telecommunication wavelength of 1.55 μm. Such a nano-rib-based waveguide outperforms its conventional hybrid and plasmonic waveguiding counterparts, demonstrating tighter optical confinement for similar propagation distances and a significantly enhanced figure of merit. The guiding properties of the fundamental mode are also quite robust against possible fabrication imperfections. Due to the strong confinement capability, our proposed hybrid configuration features ultralow waveguide cross talk and enables submicron bends with moderate attenuation as well. The outstanding optical performance renders such waveguides as promising building blocks for ultracompact passive and active silicon-based integrated photonic components.

We study light propagation through cyclic arrays, composed by copies of a given PT-symmetric dimer, using a group theoretical approach and finite element modeling. The theoretical mode-coupling analysis suggests the use of these devices as output port replicators where the dynamics is controlled by the impinging light field. This is confirmed in good agreement with finite element propagation in an experimentally feasible necklace of passive PT-symmetric dimers constructed from lossy and lossless waveguides.

We propose a simple integrated narrowband filter consisting of two grooves on the surface of a slab waveguide. Spectral filtering is performed in transmission at oblique incidence due to excitation of an eigenmode of the structure localized at a ridge cavity between the grooves. For the considered parameters, zero reflectance and unity transmittance are achieved at resonant conditions. The width and location of the transmittance peak can be controlled by changing the widths of the grooves and of the ridge, respectively. The proposed filter may find application in waveguide-integrated spectrometers.