Patent ID: 7310182

Claim:
An apparatus, comprising: a photonic crystal lattice in silicon semiconductor material, the silicon semiconductor material having a plurality of holes defined in the silicon semiconductor material, the plurality of holes periodically arranged in the silicon semiconductor material with a hole pitch and a hole radius to define the photonic crystal lattice; polysilicon semiconductor material regions disposed proximate to and insulated from respective inside surfaces of the plurality of holes defined in the silicon semiconductor material; charge modulated regions to be modulated in the polysilicon semiconductor material regions, wherein an optical beam directed through the photonic crystal lattice is modulated in response to a modulated effective photonic band gap of the photonic crystal lattice, the effective photonic band gap modulated in response to the charge modulated regions, wherein the effective photonic band gap of the photonic crystal lattice is modulated in response to a refractive index in the polysilicon semiconductor material that is modulated in response to the charge modulated regions.