Temperature tuning of the optical properties of planar photonic crystal microcavities

We report on the temperature tuning of the optical properties of photonic crystal (PhC) microcavities. Planar and one-dimensional cavities were made from two-dimensional PhCs etched in GaAs and InP based vertical waveguides. These systems were optically characterized by an internal light source technique. The samples were mounted on a Peltier stage in order to vary the temperature from 20 to 76degreesC. Linear dependence of the resonance wavelengths with respect to the temperature is observed with gradients dlambda/dT=0.09 and 0.1 nm/degreesC for GaAs and InP based cavities, respectively. These results are in agreement with theoretical calculations based on the thermal dependence of the refractive index of the PhC semiconductor component. (C) 2004 American Institute of Physics.