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  • Open Access

Giant Enhancement of Stimulated Brillouin Scattering in the Subwavelength Limit

Peter T. Rakich1,*, Charles Reinke1, Ryan Camacho1, Paul Davids1, and Zheng Wang2,3

  • 1Sandia National Laboratories, P.O. Box 5800 Albuquerque, New Mexico 87185-1082, USA
  • 2Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA
  • 3Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Microelectronics Research Center, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78758 USA

  • *rakich@alum.mit.edu.
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Phys. Rev. X 2, 011008 – Published 30 January, 2012

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevX.2.011008

Abstract

Stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) is traditionally viewed as a process whose strength is dictated by intrinsic material nonlinearities with little dependence on waveguide geometry. We show that this paradigm breaks down at the nanoscale, as tremendous radiation pressures produce new forms of SBS nonlinearities. A coherent combination of radiation pressure and electrostrictive forces is seen to enhance both forward and backward SBS processes by orders of magnitude, creating new geometric degrees of freedom through which photon-phonon coupling becomes highly tailorable. At nanoscales, the backward-SBS gain is seen to be 104 times greater than in conventional silica fibers with 100 times greater values than predicted by conventional SBS treatments. Furthermore, radically enhanced forward-SBS processes are 105 times larger than any known waveguide system. In addition, when nanoscale silicon waveguides are cooled to low temperatures, a further 10–100 times increase in SBS gain is seen as phonon losses are reduced. As a result, a 100−μm segment of the waveguide has equivalent nonlinearity to a kilometer of fiber. Couplings of this magnitude would enable efficient chip-scale stimulated Brillouin scattering in silicon waveguides for the first time. More generally, we develop a new full-vectorial theoretical formulation of stimulated Brillouin scattering that accurately incorporates the effects of boundary-induced nonlinearities and radiation pressure, both of which are seen to have tremendous impact on photon-phonon coupling at subwavelength scales. This formalism, which treats both intermode and intramode coupling within periodic and translationally invariant waveguide systems, reveals a rich landscape of new stimulated Brillouin processes when applied to nanoscale systems.

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Popular Summary

Stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) in an optical medium is a nonlinear process through which intense laser light interacts with a material to produce coherent phonons through photon-phonon coupling. Since its discovery in 1964, stimulated Brillouin scattering in bulk macroscopic) media and (micron-scaled) optical fibers has been extensively studied and exploited for manipulating both phonons and photons. Realizations of coherent phonon generation, slow light, and a host of new light sources are just a few examples of its importance. Through stimulated Brillouin scattering, the photon-phonon coupling is generally mediated by electrostriction—a nonlinear contraction of the material under the influence of the light—and depends very little on the geometry or size of the material. In this theoretical paper, we open up a new direction in the study of stimulated Brillouin scattering by demonstrating that a new, powerful, and geometry-dependent form of stimulated Brillouin scattering emerges in the absence of intrinsic material electrostriction as light is confined to nanoscales.

The systems we have investigated are nanoscale waveguides. The new form of stimulated Brillouin scattering has its origin in the enormous radiation pressure generated by light confined to the nanoscale and in a boundary-induced nonlinearity. We show that the radiation pressure and the boundary-induced nonlinearity can already generate powerful SBS nonlinearity on their own. When coherently combined with electrostriction, they are seen to produce giant SBS effects that are several orders of magnitude stronger than what has been seen to date in any other waveguide system. Such enhanced couplings could enable efficient stimulated Brillouin scattering in silicon waveguides for the first time.

More generally, we have developed a new theoretical formulation of stimulated Brillouin scattering that accurately incorporates the effects of boundary-induced nonlinearities and radiation pressure, both of which are shown to have tremendous impact on photon-phonon coupling at subwavelength scales. Our application of this formalism already reveals a rich landscape of new stimulated Brillouin processes within nanoscale systems. More applications of this formalism in the rapidly developing field of optomechanics are certainly to be expected.

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Phys. Rev. X 2, 011008– Published 30 January, 2012
  • Received 22 August 2011
Article part of CHORUS
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This article is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.

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