Full three dimensional inverse design of dielectric slab based scattering optical elements devices

Inverse design through optimization of dielectric photonic devices is a very powerful tool. However so far the direct solver used in the design process is almost always restricted to solve Maxwell's equation in two dimensions (2D). Here we will show that by using a specific three dimensional (3D) electromagnetic field-solver we can implement a full 3D inverse design tool for Silicon On Insulator (SOI) slab based photonic structures which can be run on a normal desktop computer.