Gap opening and split band edges in waveguides coupled by a periodic system of small windows (Q358159)

The authors provide a mathematical rigorous description of the split band wedge in coupled waveguides. More precisely, let \(H^{\varepsilon}\) be the Laplacian in an infinite straight strip, \(\mathbb{R} \times (-d,\pi), 0<d< \pi\), with Dirichlet boundary conditions at the lines \(x_{2}=-d, x_{2}=\pi\) and Neumann boundary condition at the line \(x_{2}=0\), except at the intervals \(\omega^{\varepsilon}_{n} = (2nh- \varepsilon, 2nh+ \varepsilon) \times \left\{ 0 \right\}, n \in \mathbb{Z}, \varepsilon \geq 0\). The Hamiltonian \(H^{\varepsilon}\) describes a system of two waveguides coupled by the \(2h\)-periodic system of windows \(\omega^{\varepsilon}_{n}\). The Hamiltonian \(H^{0}\) can be decomposed as \(H^{0}=H_{+} \oplus H_{-}\), where \(H_{\pm}\) are Laplacians with Dirichlet boundary conditions at \(x_{2}=\pi\), respectively at \(x_{2}=-d\) and Neumann conditions at \(x_{2}=0\). Let \(H_{\pm}=\int_{(-\pi,\pi]}^{\oplus} H_{\pm}(k)\, dk\) be the Bloch-Floquet decomposition of the operators \(H_{\pm}\), with elementary cell \((-h,h)\times (0,\pi)\), respectively \((-h,h)\times (-d,0)\). The main result of the paper gives sufficient conditions on the eigenvalues of \(H_{\pm}(k)\) in order that \(H^{\varepsilon}\) admits a spectral gap. Asymptotics of the endpoints of the spectral gap, for \(\varepsilon \rightarrow 0\), are also provided.