Desktop laboratory of bound states in the continuum in metallic waveguide with dielectric cavities

Abstract

A metallic waveguide with an integrated dielectric rod is equivalent to a periodic array of rods and readily allows to achieve bound states in the continuum, dependent on the position and orientation of the rod relative to the waveguide. This significantly facilitates experimental studies in comparison to the infinite arrays of cavities. However, the main advantage is related to material losses and structural fluctuations in long arrays of rods which quickly saturate the growth of the Q-factor with the number of rods in the periodic array in the GHz range, at least.