Strongly Resonant Transmission of Electromagnetic Radiation in Periodic Anisotropic Layered Media

The electromagnetic dispersion in periodic layered media can be tailored and their resonant properties can be considerably improved by utilizing anisotropic materials. Periodic structures with a photonic band edge split into two parts, or so-called split band edge, exhibit superior resonant properties including exceptionally high Q-values of transmission resonances and nearly perfect impedance matching at the boundaries, even when the number of unit cells N is not large. A microwave transmission resonance with Q~220 is demonstrated in a periodic stack of form-birefringent layers with N=12 realized in a waveguide geometry.