Resonant behavior and selective switching of stop bands in three-dimensional photonic crystals with inhomogeneous components.

We demonstrate that, in contrast with the well-studied photonic crystals consisting of two homogeneous components, photonic crystals comprised of inhomogeneous or multiple (three or more) components may bring new opportunities to photonics due to the discovered quasiperiodic resonant behavior of their (hkl) stop bands as a function of the reciprocal lattice vector. A resonant stop band cannot be switched off for any permittivity of structural components. Tuning the permittivity or structural parameters allows the selective on-off switching of nonresonant (hkl) stop bands. This independent manipulation of light at different Bragg wavelengths provides a new degree of freedom to design selective optical switches and waveguides. Transmission experiments performed on synthetic opals confirmed the theoretical predictions.