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Coherent emission of light using stacked gratings

A novel metallic grating with narrow air slit can behave like a homogeneous slab with large permittivity and small permeability. This interaction between the metallic grating and the Bragg grating gives rise to impedance matching at wavelengths located in the Bragg photonic band gap, which enables these gratings to emit high levels of thermal emission with the unique ultra-narrow spectrum and antenna-like spatial response. This breakthrough in creating an ultra-narrow spectrum will open up robust, cost effective and novel infrared light sources for applications in thermal analysis, imaging, security, bio-sensing and medical diagnostics without the safety drawbacks of infrared lasers.