Planewave remittances of an axially excited chiral sculptured thin film with gain

Reflectances and transmittances of chiral sculptured thin films (STFs) with gain qualitatively differ from those of lossless and lossy chiral STFs, chiefly at the edges of the Bragg regime, for normally incident plane waves. The difference is explained in terms of the photonic density of states. A chiral STF with a central twist defect exhibits a reflection hole if there is no gain and emits narrowband radiation if there is gain, provided the thickness is not large. This narrowband feature diminishes as the thickness increases, and is replaced by an ultranarrowband transmission hole only if the chiral STF has neither gain nor loss.