Absolute photonic band gaps of two-dimensional square-lattice photonic crystals with Taiji-shaped dielectric rods

A novel structure of two-dimensional (2D) square-lattice photonic crystal (SLPC) composed of Taiji-shaped dielectric rods imbedded in air is constructed and the properties of absolute photonic band gap (PBG) are theoretically analyzed in both the number and width by Plane Wave Expansion Method (PWM). By comparing the absolute PBGs in 2D SLPCs consisting of four shapes of rods with different symmetries (circle, button, semicircle and Taiji) at the same filling ratio, we find that both the number and width of absolute PBG significantly increase with the breaking of scatterer's symmetry, and the Taiji-shaped rods with the poorest symmetry can attain both the most number and the largest width of absolute PBGs. Additionally, we also study the influence of dielectric constant epsilon and three geometric parameters of Taiji-shaped scatterer on the absolute PBG and discover that the SLPC with Taiji-shaped rods can generate at most nine absolute PBGs and the largest absolute PBG with the width 0.0485 (omega a/2 pi c). (c) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.