Nanophotonics: Stopping light, nonreciprocity, and metamaterials

In this paper we review our recent works in developing photonic crystals and nanophotonic structures for the control of light. We show that dynamic crystal structures, in which the refractive index of the material is modulated by a small extent while a photon pulse is in the crystal, can be used to stop, store and even time-reverse light pulses [1][2][3]. We also show that by incorporating magneto-optical effects into the crystal structures, the reciprocity of light can be broken, resulting in uni-directional devices that are extremely compact [4], And finally, by exploiting sub-wavelength electromagnetic resonances in meta structures, new meta-materials can be created. These materials feature frequency-independent refractive index that is controlled by geometry and can be arbitrarily large [5]. Such materials can be of importance for integrated optics and image sensing applications.