Photonic band structure in a two-dimensional hexagonal lattice of equilateral triangles

In this paper, the plane wave expansion method is used to calculate the photonic band structure (PBS) for the transverse electric (TE) polarization in a two-dimensional hexagonal lattice composed air holes with cross-sections in the shape of equilateral triangles embedded in a GaAs background. We consider that the dielectric constant of GaAs is dependent on both hydrostatic pressure and temperature. Further, an increase can be observed in the width of the photonic band gap (PBG) while the lengths of the sides of the equilateral triangles are increased. When the pressure increases in the presence of a constant temperature, the dielectric constant of GaAs decreases; further, the PBS exhibits a more noticeable shift toward regions of higher frequencies than that observed while the temperature is increased at a given pressure. We also observed that the PBG obtained by rotating the triangular holes by an angle θ increases when compared against the results obtained for the lattice of holes without performing any rotation. In addition, the results obtained using the supercell technique denote that the position and width of the PBG remain unchanged while removing a triangular hole from the structure, denoting the presence of a defective band within the PBG.