Magnetophotonic Crystals.

Photonic crystals, which are periodic composites of macroscopic dielectric media of different refractive index, affect the propagation of light in much the same way that semiconductor crystals affect the propagation of electrons. When photonic crystals are composed of magnetic materials such as rare-earth iron garnet, they are called as magnetophotonic crystals providing unique optical and magnetooptical properties. For instance, introduction of the magnetic material into the medium as a defect yields very large magneto-optical Faraday effect due to the localization of light at the magnetic defect. In this article, our recent investigations on one-dimensional magnetophotonic crystals composed of rare-earth iron garnet films such as Bi-substituted yttrium iron garnet (Bi:YIG) are summarized, and the very unique properties of the media are demonstrated for the films with (SiO2/Ta2O5)k/Bi:YIG/(Ta2O5/SiO2)k structures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]