Experimental probe of twist angle–dependent band structure of on-chip optical bilayer photonic crystal

• DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adh8498
• Publication Date: 2023-07-12T17:58:38Z
• Authors: Haoning Tang; Beicheng Lou; Fan Du; Mingjie Zhang; Xueqi Ni; Weijie Xu; Rebekah Jin; Shanhui Fan; Eric Mazur

Recently, twisted bilayer photonic materials have been extensively used for creating and studying photonic tunability through interlayer couplings. While twisted bilayer photonic materials have been experimentally demonstrated in microwave regimes, a robust platform for experimentally measuring optical frequencies has been elusive. Here, we demonstrate the first on-chip optical twisted bilayer photonic crystal with twist angle–tunable dispersion and great simulation-experiment agreement. Our results reveal a highly tunable band structure of twisted bilayer photonic crystals due to moiré scattering. This work opens the door to realizing unconventional twisted bilayer properties and novel applications in optical frequency regimes.