Acta Photonica Sinica, Volume. 54, Issue 8, 0819001(2025)

Study on Transmission Characteristics of Valley Photonic Crystal Waveguide Based on Triangular Lattice

Weijian TIAN1,2, Xinyu ZHANG1,2, Yuting MIN1,2, Mingquan PI1,2、*, Fang SONG1,2, Yiding WANG1,2, and Chuantao ZHENG1,2
Author Affiliations
  • 1State Key Laboratory of Integrated Optoelectronics, JLU Region, College of Electronic Science and Engineering,Jilin University, Changchun 130012, China
  • 2Jilin Provincial Engineering Research Center of Infrared Gas Sensing Technique, Changchun 130012, China
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    Photonic crystal waveguides serve as fundamental components of integrated photonic circuits, yet their performance is fundamentally limited by scattering losses from defect-based light confinement. While traditional waveguides suffer from significant backscattering and lateral losses, particularly in bent configurations, valley photonic crystal waveguides offer a paradigm shift through topological protection. By exploiting valley degrees of freedom, these waveguides enable pseudospin-dependent unidirectional propagation, scattering-immune edge states, and intrinsic defect tolerance, all arising from their engineered topological band structure. However, practical implementation requires careful co-optimization between topological design and nanofabrication constraints including feature size and spacing. Resolving design and manufacturing issues is crucial to develop robust, scalable photonic circuits that perform reliably despite fabrication variations.This investigation focuses on valley photonic crystal waveguides based on triangular lattice configurations, which offer distinct advantages over conventional honeycomb lattice designs. Through systematic comparison, we demonstrate that while both architectures can achieve similar operational bandwidths in principle, the triangular lattice configuration provides significantly relaxed fabrication requirements. More importantly, when operating under comparable fabrication tolerances, the triangular lattice design exhibits substantially broader bandwidth capabilities. This combination of performance and manufacturability makes it particularly attractive for practical implementations in foundry-based photonic integration platforms. Our comprehensive numerical study employs finite element method to analyze five distinct triangular lattice configurations. This parametric investigation reveals how geometric variations influence the photonic band structure and edge state characteristics. The optimization process carefully balances multiple competing factors including transmission bandwidth and fabrication tolerance. After extensive analysis, we identify an optimal triangular lattice configuration with a 410 nm lattice constant and triangular air holes having 246 nm side lengths (0.6a0) that achieves an exceptional balance between optical performance and practical realizability. The waveguide structures demonstrate remarkable resilience against fabrication imperfections. Our study reveals that in triangular-lattice valley photonic crystal unit cells, the bandgap width increases with the enlargement of the triangular air-hole side length.Then, the boundary state energy band of triangular lattice valley photonic crystal based on diagonal domain wall structure is simulated, and straight waveguide and“Z”shaped waveguide are designed based on this structure. Both straight and“Z”shaped configurations maintain excellent transmission properties even with intentional lattice defects introduced to simulate realistic fabrication variations. A detailed characteristic analysis reveals interesting operational differences:“Z”shaped waveguide exhibits remarkable defect tolerance, while the straight waveguide offers a broader transmission bandwidth. These complementary characteristics enable system designers to select the optimal configuration based on specific application requirements. The implications of these findings extend across multiple domains of photonic technology. The combination of relaxed fabrication requirements and inherent defect tolerance makes these waveguides particularly suitable for large-scale photonic integration where manufacturing variations are unavoidable. Their ability to maintain high transmission through sharp bends enables more compact device footprints without performance compromise. These advantages open new possibilities in optical communications for high-density interconnects, in sensing applications where environmental stability is crucial, and in emerging fields like topological photonic computing that demand robust information processing architectures. Looking forward, the design principles developed here may also be extended to other photonic crystal geometries and material systems, potentially enabling new classes of robust photonic devices. As nanofabrication techniques continue advancing, the performance of these waveguides can be further enhanced while maintaining their inherent robustness advantages.In summary, the triangular lattice valley photonic crystal waveguide proposed in this paper has great advantages in transmission bandwidth and device size compared with the honeycomb lattice valley photonic crystal waveguide. At the same time, it has the characteristics of easy processing and manufacturing, immune to lattice defects to some extent, large-angle broken-line transmission and so on, which is expected to improve the integration and robustness of optical chips and be applied to spintronics and quantum computing in the future.

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    Weijian TIAN, Xinyu ZHANG, Yuting MIN, Mingquan PI, Fang SONG, Yiding WANG, Chuantao ZHENG. Study on Transmission Characteristics of Valley Photonic Crystal Waveguide Based on Triangular Lattice[J]. Acta Photonica Sinica, 2025, 54(8): 0819001

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    Paper Information

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    Received: Apr. 10, 2025

    Accepted: Jun. 3, 2025

    Published Online: Sep. 26, 2025

    The Author Email: Mingquan PI (pimingquan@jlu.edu.cn)

    DOI:10.3788/gzxb20255408.0819001

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