Products

Ansys Lumerical FDTD Simulation of
Photonic Components

Ansys Lumerical FDTD is the gold-standard for modeling photonic components, processes, and materials. The integrated design environment provides scripting capability, advanced post-processing, and optimization methods.

Overview

ANSYS LUMERICAL FDTD Industry’s Leading Choice for Versatile and Scalable Photonic Design

Ansys Lumerical FDTD is photonic simulation software that integrates FDTD, RCWA, and STACK solvers in a single design environment. This empowers precise analysis and optimization for various devices, including diffraction gratings, multilayered coatings, uLEDs, CMOS image sensors, metalenses, and metasurfaces, delivering best-in-class performance across diverse applications. Ansys Lumerical FDTD empowers rapid virtual prototyping and verification of thousands of iterations for the most complex designs.

Features

Quick Specs

Ansys Lumerical FDTD works seamlessly with Ansys Lumerical CML Compiler, Ansys Multiphysics solvers, Ansys Speos, Ansys Zemax, and third-party electronic-photonic design automation (EPDA) vendors to enable fast, accurate, scalable photonic design.

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Performance and accuracy with FDTD

Scale with HPC, GPU, and cloud

Connect with optiSLang for optimization

Periodic structures analysis

Multilayer thin films analysis

Connects with multiscale and multiphysics

Automation API

Simulate gratings, polarizers, and coatings

Particle swarm

Fatigue Life Analysis

Capabilities

Versatile and Scalable Photonic Design Powered by Lumerical FDTD

Lumerical FDTD is industry’s leading simulation software for design and optimization of a wide range of photonic components. Lumerical FDTD is remarkably versatile and scalable, offering unmatched speed and the ability to harness HPC (CPU and multi-GPU) and cloud resources.

Capabilities

Key Features

FDTD 3D Electromagnetic Solver

Ansys Lumerical FDTD solver is the flagship of Lumerical. It’s an optimized solver based on the Finite-Difference Time-Domain simulating the light propagation in photonic structures at nanoscale.

It has high accuracy with options for auto non-uniform meshes. Lumerical FDTD is also foundry compatible and supports automated design processes with its scripting capabilities, advanced post-processing, and optimization routines.

RCWA Solver

Based on the Rigorous Coupled Wave Analysis method, Lumerical RCWA complements Lumerical FDTD and STACK by rapidly simulating light scattering for periodic and multilayer structures.

RCWA provides fast simulations of complex multilayer stacks with surface patterning, from capturing the electric and magnetic field distributions to transmitting, reflecting, and evaluating power in each grating order.

STACK Solver

The STACK Analytic solver is faster than the direct simulation of Maxwell’s equations.

It is ideal for rapid prototyping for thin film applications. From capturing microcavity effects and interference to handling dipole illumination and plane wave functions, STACK provides quick simulations of complex thin film multilayer stacks.

Photonic Inverse Design

Automatically discover optimal designs and geometries for a targeted figure of merit.

Discover non-intuitive geometries that optimize performance, minimize area, and improve manufacturability.

Post-processing Analysis

Powerful post-processing capability, including far-field projection, band structure analysis, bidirectional scattering distribution function (BSDF) generation, Q-factor analysis, and charge generation rate.

Nonlinearity and Anisotropy

Simulate devices fabricated with nonlinear materials or materials with spatially varying anisotropy.

Choose from various nonlinear, negative index, and gain models. Define new material models with flexible material plug-ins.

Material Multi-coefficient Models

Use multi-coefficient models for accurate material modeling over large wavelength ranges.

Automatically generate models from sample data or define the functions yourself.

3D CAD Environment

The integrated design environment provides scripting capability, advanced post-processing, and optimization methods.

FDTD’s CAD environment and parameterizable simulation objects allow rapid model iterations for 2D and 3D models. It provides eye comfort with Dark Mode and is fully compatible with 4k high DPI screens and modern 3D views.

Layer Builder

Create 3D multi-layered structures from planar unpatterned layers and patterns imported from a GDS file.

Change the position, ordering, and thickness of each layer. Simulate curved side-angled waveguides, then export the layer configuration, including material data, as a process file (.lbr) that foundries can fabricate.

Lumerical Connectors in Ansys optiSLang

Advanced Photonic Simulation Workflow with state-of-the-art algorithms for design exploration, optimization, robustness, and reliability analysis

Automate multiphysics simulation workflows and benefit from the state-of-the-art sensitivity analysis and optimization algorithms available in optiSLang.

Ansys Optics Solution Interoperability

Lumerical is part of Ansys Optics, providing interoperability solutions and design workflows with OpticStudio and Speos.

The Lumerical Sub-Wavelength Model (LSWM) plugin allows you to simulate and design coatings, polarizers, and diffraction gratings in OpticStudio and Speos.