Three-dimensional photonic-crystal emission through thermal excitation.

A three-dimensional tungsten photonic crystal is thermally excited and shown to emit light at a narrow band, lambda = 3.3-4.25 microm. The emission is experimentally observed to exceed that of the free-space Planck radiation over a wide temperature range, T = 475-850 K. It is proposed that an enhanced density of state associated with the propagating electromagnetic Bloch waves in the photonic crystal is responsible for this experimental finding.