Characterization of metal-dielectric photonic crystals

We discuss a new photonic crystal structure that arise out of including extremely thin metallic inserts in a standard dielectric photonic crystal (DPC). We had denominated dielectric-metallic photonic crystal (DMPC) to these combined structures to distinguish them from the metal dielectric photonic crystal (MDPC) with a single dielectric substrates and DPC, even when they preserve features from both, they have features of their own as a metal-dielectric structure. In this work, we numerically analyze a dielectric-metallic photonic crystal in a microsphere arrangement, characterizing the corresponding Bragg frequency and the dielectric and metallic stopgaps. In particular, we are interested in the dependence of the dielectric width σD and the metallic width σM respectively, as functions of the refraction index difference and the metal thickness d. We also discuss the structural flexibility introduced by the dielectric-metallic photonic crystal in the stopgaps pattern.