How Do I Use Heat Data in a FDTD Simulation?

Date	Category
2025-06-17 15:50:52	Heat

The integration with a Heat and FDTD simulation is seamlessly achieved with the PerturbationMedium and Scene objects, which allow the use of the same geometry for both physics simulations. The main steps are:

• Define the PerturbationMediums and create the Scene object.

• Create the Heat simulation from the Scene object using the from_scene method.

• Create the Simulation object and call the method Scene.perturbed_mediums_copy, inputting the temperature information from the Heat simulation data.

The mediums for a Heat simulation are defined using the PerturbationMedium class. This class accepts a perturbation_spec object that models the refractive index variation as a function of temperature, such as the LinearHeatPerturbation model, which represents a linear dependence of the refractive index on temperature.

The mediums are then assigned to their respective geometries and included in a Scene object. After the Heat simulation is complete, the optical simulation can be easily generated either by using Scene.perturbed_mediums_copy in combination with Simulation.from_scene, or by using the Simulation.perturbed_mediums_copy method, which automatically creates an FDTD simulation object incorporating the temperature data from the Heat simulation.

This process is illustrated in the Thermally Tuned Ring Resonator example.