Enhancement of extraction efficiency by metallic photonic crystal embedding in light-emitting diode

The bandgap effect of photonic crystals (PCs) and the effect of grating diffraction can be used to improve the extraction efficiency of light from the light-emitting diode (LED). The transmission of light at certain wavelength through periodic sub-wavelength hole arrays in metal films is extraordinary, surface plasmon (SP) effects effectively. In this letter, silver metallic photonic crystals with square lattice of cylinder unit cells are fabricated in GaN layer of GaN-based blue LED. We use the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method to investigate the optical transmission, the results show that the light extraction efficiency is enhanced by more than four times. Then we use the surface plasmon dispersion relation to analyze the mechanism of antireflection.