Direct Observation of Non-Markovian Radiation Dynamics in 3D Bulk Photonic Crystals

Since the very first proposition of photonic crystals, their influence on the dynamics of spontaneous emission has been of great interest. The radiation dynamics is described by an integration kernel which - in a spectral representation -comprises two equally important contributions: the Lamb shift and the radiative contribution to the linewidth. The latter is connected to the density of states via Fermi’s golden rule. To our knowledge, we present the first spatially resolved measurement of the complete radiation dynamics in a photonic crystal and of its local density of states over a wide spectral range. To this end we study a single magnetic dipole situated in a photonic crystal with a band gap at microwave frequencies and find non-Markovian behavior in excellent agreement with ab initio calculations