Kolloide: Neuartige Bausteine für Photonische Kristalle. Synthese, Bildungsmechanismus, Charakterisierung und Kristallisation von Hochindex-Partikeln

• Applicant: Dr. Stefanie Eiden
• Subject Area: Experimental Condensed Matter Physics
• Term: from 2003 to 2005
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 5400636

Photonic crystals are materials patterned with a periodic variation of the refractive index creating a range of forbidden optical frequencies called a photonic band gap. A photonic band gap modifies fundamentally the propagation and emission processes of light. Based upon these effects novel integrated-photonic materials can be designed, opening various new areas of applications. Photonic crystals, composed of colliodal high index spheres with mono- and bimodal sphere size, should be synthesized. For that purpose in a first step the synthesis of monodisperse high index particles are developed and optimized. To achieve a good monodispersity investigations of the formation process are necessary. In a next step the particles will be exactly characterized, because the refractive index strongly depends on the structure and the composition of the particles. In a last step the colloidal particles are crystallized to novel colloidal crystals either by self-organization or by layer-by-layer method. Finally, the similar high index particles will be used in strongly disordered samples to search for the onset light localization.

• DFG Programme: Priority Programmes
• Subproject of: SPP 1113: Photonic Crystals