Photonic crystals: fundamentals and applications

The birth some fifteen years ago of the so called photonic band gap materials gave rise to a whole new approach to the molding the flow of electromagnetic radiation in a way never before even dreamed of by those using optical fibres and waveguides. It also staggered many concepts in light generation or detection and even many phenomena were made possible that had theretofore not been foreseen. Here a brief account is given of the concepts involved, the applications realized and the fabrication methods with a special emphasis in self assembled systems for their ease and low cost of manufacture which has made them one the most popular approach. The semiconductor microelectronics world has taken to producing these new structures since their technology is very well suited for the purpose and the achievements are more astonishing every day.