Guided Modes in the Plane Array of Optical Waveguides

It is known that for an isolated dielectric cylinder waveguide there exists the cutoff frequency $\omega_\ast$ below which there is no guided mode. It is shown in the paper that the infinite plane periodic array of such waveguides possesses the guided modes in the frequency domain which is below the frequency $\omega_\ast$. In the case of a finite array, the modes in this frequency domain are weakly radiating ones, but their quality factor $Q$ increases with the number of waveguides $N$ as $Q(N)\sim N^3$. This dependence is obtained both numerically, using the multiple scattering formalism, and is justified with a simple analytical model.