In this work, a novel spiral Airy beam with ultra-long anti-diffraction propagation distance and spiral intensity distribution is generated and studied. Changing the vortex topology charges and circular Airy phase parameters can flexibly modulate the properties of the beam, such as beam size, spiral intensity shape, propagation direction, and anti-diffraction propagation distance. Such beam has the property of self-healing and can restore to the spiral pattern. An array of spiral Airy beams can also be generated, and the spiral patterns and propagation directions of each beam of the array can be manipulated. This beam can be utilized in various applications such as optical tweezers and laser processing for chiral structures.
In this work, transverse optical vortices with phase singularities and orbital angular momentum are generated by the interference of three linearly polarized lights. The positions of the transverse optical vortices can be regulated by the relative amplitude and initial phase of the three incident lights. An analytical model is built for control the positions of the generated vortices and its correctness is proved by FDTD simulation, and a method for judging the positive or negative topological charge of the transverse vortices is derived. Based on the Poynting vector distribution of the transverse vortex field, it is found that there is an inverse energy flow near the phase singularity, that is, Poynting vector points to the light source rather than the propagation direction. It is further found that the controllable singularities and the backward energy flow region of the vortex field are very sensitive to the scattering of nanoparticles. When a single metal nanoparticle is placed in the region, several singularity lines with specific directions can be found in the scattering field. By changing the relative position of the single metal nanoparticle to the singularity in nanoscale, the directions of the singularity lines can be modulated. This work realizes the generation and manipulation of transverse optical vortices, and reveals the interaction between the transverse phase singularity and the scattering of metal nanoparticles, which is expected to be applied to nanoscale displacement sensing for nanoparticles.
The optical tweezers (OT) use optical force to trap micro/nano particles. This technology has widely been employed in manipulating cells, viruses and atoms, etc. Optical fiber tweezers (OFT), as a novel type of OTs, possess excellent characteristics of easy fabrication, strong anti-interference ability, high compatibility with chip devices, and flexible operation with a compact structure. Usually, the OFT probes are tapered, but they have a low optical trap strength, which makes it difficult to capture smaller particles (sub-micron size). In this study, we demonstrate theoretical analyses of the fields and optical forces with different fiber structures, including the tapered, spherical, hemispherical, zone plate, and gold-overlapped endface. Numerical simulations are carried out to investigate the magnitude and direction of the optical force exerted on microparticles in water. The results reveal that the shape of the fiber endface structure significantly alters the distribution of the optical field. The hemispherical and tapered endface have a similar ability to trap microparticles. The spherical and zone plate endface is better than the two endface mentioned above. Meanwhile, the use of gold-overlapped fiber tips can strongly constrain the dielectric microparticles on the endface, achieving effective two-dimensional trapping. This research offers theoretical guidance for designing and optimizing fiber endface structures for efficient optical micro-manipulations.
Momentum is the basic physical characteristic of light, and the exchange of momentum between light and matter results in optical force. In recent years, the spin Hall effect and it induced lateral optical forces have drawn wide attentions. This work focuses on the lateral optical forces exerted on a gold particle on gold film in a horizontally incident light field, which is essentially due to the coupling effect of spin angular momentum and multipole resonance caused by symmetry breaking. In the horizontally incident circularly polarized light field, as the size of the particles increases, the polar resonance mode of the particles undergoes a transition from electric dipole, quadrupole, hexapole, and octupole mode. This process of change is accompanied by the lateral optical force increasing in the initial stage, and then decreasing till reversed into an opposite direction. This work provides new insights into the mechanism of lateral optical force generation, and offers an additional dimension for optical manipulation of micro and nano particles.
Nonlinear responses of nanoparticles induce enlightening phenomena in optical tweezers. With the gradual increase in optical intensity, effects from saturable absorption (SA) and reverse SA (RSA) arise in sequence and thereby modulate the nonlinear properties of materials. In current nonlinear optical traps, however, the underlying physical mechanism is mainly confined within the SA regime because threshold values required to excite the RSA regime are extremely high. Herein, we demonstrate, both in theory and experiment, nonlinear optical tweezing within the RSA regime, proving that a fascinating composite trapping state is achievable at ultrahigh intensities through an optical force reversal induced through nonlinear absorption. Integrated results help in perfecting the nonlinear optical trapping system, thereby providing beneficial guidance for wider applications of nonlinear optics.
Femtosecond laser with different polarizations can induce different types of periodic structures in fabrication of metal, semiconductor and dielectric materials. Most previous works reported that direction of the laser induced periodic surface structure (LIPSS) is perpendicular to the polarization direction of the laser. Polarization state of the vectoral polarized beam exerts an axisymmetric distribution in the beam cross-section. Over the years, femtosecond laser fabrication based on vectoral beams is attracting more and more attentions, which indicates novel properties and applications for induction of microstructures on surface. In this work . we used vortex wave plate to convert linearly polarized light into first-order and second-order vector beams respectively. We produced various types of LIPSS by single-point ablation on the SiC surface and analyzed period of the LIPSS by Fourier transform. In addition, we also analyzed variations of the LIPSS at different scanning speeds on the SiC surface.
Surface plasmon polariton (SPP) can break though the traditional optical diffraction limit, and thus provides an important platform for the design of various nanophotonic devices. However, it is still a big challenge to achieve manipulation of SPP in both spatially nanoscale and temporally ultrafast conditions. Here, we propose a method of spatiotemporal manipulation of femtosecond SPP pulses, and achieve the functions including dynamically controlled wavefront rotation and redirection of SPP propagation. This work has great potential in applications such as ultrafast on-chip photonic information processing, ultrafast beam shaping and attosecond pulse generation.
To realize the on-chip detection of cylindric vector beams (CVBs), we propose a method with a chiral plasmonic lens, which make the left-handed circularly polarized part of CVB form a strong plasmonic focus, and the focus position depends on the polarization order of CVB. To avoid the scanning of whole plasmonic field, we change the incident angle of CVB to keep the focus at the center where a waveguide is placed for detection. Then we only needs to measure the incident angle where the light in the waveguide reaches the peak, and the corresponding CVB order can be obtained.
Interaction between plasmonic nanostructures and external light can excite coherent oscillation of electrons, thereby brings a field enhancement due to the localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR). Due to their excellent characteristics, metallic gap nanostructures have been widely used in front research fields, such as physics, biomedical sciences, food chemistries, etc.. Intensity of the plasmonic field in metallic GAP structures can be enhanced with orders of magnitude compared to the excitation beam, which provides an effective tool to investigate nonlinear effects. The nonlinear variation of physical properties, especially for dielectric constant and polarizability of the plasmonic Bowtie structures, will introduce great influences on the field distribution. Consequently, the optical force and potential well in such gap structures show novel properties. This new characteristics will play a significant role in future developments and applications of plasmonic tweezers.
Here, we propose and investigate a graphene-based opt-thermoelectric nanotweezers, which replace the nano-metallic films in common opt-thermoelectric tweezers by graphene, and show advantages of single-layer graphene structure, broad working wavelength range from visible to infrared, and less toxicity for biological samples. We theoretically study the properties of thermoelectric force and optical force in trapping particles, and then experimentally verify the influence of different parameters on the trapping stiffness, including different polarization states of light, particle sizes, and incident laser energies. An enhanced particle manipulation accuracy within 50 nm has been achieved in experiment.
Conventional optical-resolution photoacoustic microscopy is limited by poor axial imaging resolution because of insufficient ultrasound detection bandwidth. Here we propose a polarization-differential surface plasmon sensor for photoacoustic detection, and realized an enhanced noise-equivalent-pressure sensitivity of ~120 Pa and a much broader photoacoustic bandwidth over 200 MHz, which provides an axial resolution of ~6.5 µm. We demonstrated that the capability in such micrometer-scale resolution enables in vivo volumetric label-free imaging of the microvasculature in not only the thin ear but also the thick forelimb of living mice. With advantages of reflection-mode signal capture, improved photoacoustic detection sensitivity and bandwidth, our system offers more opportunities for biomedical investigation.
Optical tweezers have found applications in many areas, the nonlinear effects play a significant role in femtosecond laser trappings. Here, we demonstrated that the traps are determined by the longitudinal electric field component due to the Kerr effect in nonlinear optical tweezers. Furthermore, we used a linearly polarized femtosecond laser as the trapping source to study the intrinsic bistability effect in nonlinear optical tweezers. A bistable state is demonstrated where the critical value shows big difference in incident power up- and down- sweeping process, showing a novel prospective in future.
KEYWORDS: Acoustics, In vivo imaging, Sensors, Surface plasmons, Image resolution, Reflectivity, Photoacoustic microscopy, Ultrasonics, Signal detection, Imaging systems
Photoacoustic (PA) microscopy can measure the optical absorption properties of tissues with high specificity. However, most photoacoustic microscopy (PAM) systems use piezoelectric ultrasonic transducers for PA pressure detection. Due to the limited bandwidth, the axial resolution of PA imaging is low (generally lager than 20-μm), resulting in inaccurate positioning of light absorbing biomolecules. Moreover, the large difference in spatial resolution between the axial and lateral directions severely degrades the reconstruction of the three-dimensional image of the tissue. Surface plasmon resonance sensing (SPR) has an ultra-fast time response and thus is expected to increase the detection bandwidth of PA waves. The disturbance of the PA pressure wave causes the refractive index change of the medium near the sensing layer, which modulates the SPR field. By detecting the change of the optical reflectivity, wideband PA detection can be realized. Here, we combine the SPR detector and an acoustic cavity with the ellipsoid inner surface for PA detection, which not only enhances the signal detection sensitivity, but also realizes the reflection-mode PA imaging. The experimental results show that the imaging signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) increases by around three times, and the detection bandwidth is more than 70-MHz. High resolution and high contrast vascular imaging of mouse ear is acquired in vivo.
We developed a reflection-mode broadband photoacoustic microscopy (PAM) based on surface plasmon resonance (SPR). Taking advantage of high-sensitivity refractive index sensing and ultrafast time response of the SPR sensor, photoacoustic (PA) transients can be measured accurately. The PAM system shows, experimentally, the available detection bandwidth of up to ~109 MHz, giving an estimated axial resolution of around 12.1 μm. A reflective objective is combined with a miniature SPR sensor, enabling the reflection-mode PAM with a lateral resolution of 5.0 μm. Using our PAM system, we image melanoma cells in vitro, providing the spatial distribution of melanin particles within melanoma cells. Further, the microvasculature is acquired in a mouse ear in vivo, delineating three-dimensional morphological characteristics of both the major blood vessels and capillaries.
We introduce a non-parity-time-symmetric three-layer structure, consisting of a gain medium layer sandwiched between two phase-change medium layers for switching of the direction of reflectionless light propagation. We show that for this structure unidirectional reflectionlessness in the forward direction can be switched to unidirectional reflectionlessness in the backward direction at the optical communication wavelength by switching the phase-change material Ge2Sb2Te5 (GST) from its amorphous to its crystalline phase. We also show that it is the existence of exceptional points for this structure with GST in both its amorphous and crystalline phases which leads to unidirectional reflectionless propagation in the forward direction for GST in its amorphous phase, and in the backward direction for GST in its crystalline phase. Our results could be potentially important for developing a new generation of compact active free-space optical devices. We also show that phase-change materials can be used to switch photonic nanostructures between cloaking and superscattering regimes at mid-infrared wavelengths. More specifically, we investigate the scattering properties of subwavelength three-layer cylindrical structures in which the material in the outer shell is the phase-change material GST. We first show that, when GST is switched between its amorphous and crystalline phases, properly designed electrically small structures can switch between resonant scattering and cloaking invisibility regimes. The contrast ratio between the scattering cross sections of the cloaking invisibility and resonant scattering regimes reaches almost unity. We then also show that larger, moderately small cylindrical structures can be designed to switch between superscattering and cloaking invisibility regimes, when GST is switched between its crystalline and amorphous phases. The contrast ratio between the scattering cross sections of cloaking invisibility and superscattering regimes can be as high as ~ 93%. Our results could be potentially important for developing a new generation of compact reconfigurable optical devices.
The optical tweezers technique has attracted extensive interest and is playing an important role in manipulating nano/micro-objects in many fields. However, number of the trapped particles are always imprecise in classical techniques, to form uncontrollable clusters at the focus. Yet, precise manipulation of a specific objective is of vital importance in many situations. Many approaches have been proposed and implemented to assist pulling or pushing forces for specific traps. They could modulate a hybrid plasmonic field to achieve a single trap while rejecting other particles, however, control of the trapping dynamics is still lacking. A simple and direct way to achieve selective trapping is still urgently needed. As trapping commences with the distribution of the optical field, tailoring the field distribution is a direct way to modulate the force and trapping results. Recently, the sharply developed metasurface technique provides a novel approach for this. We designed a chiral sensitive metalens to tailor the optical field by focusing the left-circular polarization but produces a diverging right-circular polarization beam with opposite focal length. Consequently, two independent plasmonic fields are excited at the surface plasmon resonance angle, and propagate oppositely to assist trapping and anti-trapping forces simultaneously. Combining the effects of two orthogonal circular polarizations, single target particle was stably trapped in the center while all other particles were repelled. Both theoretical simulations and experimental results validate the effectiveness of the proposed method. This points toward targeted manipulations that may find applications in single-particle assistant molecular Raman detection and assembly of plasmonic structures.
As a powerful and compact device for manipulating wavefront of light, metasurface has widely been studied in recent years. However, simultaneous control of full parameters of light (including amplitude, phase, and polarization) over a wide bandwidth is still a great challenge. In our works, we demonstrate that the combination of subwavelength plasmonic structures and detour phase could achieve full parameter control of light. Here, the traditional detour phase is used to manipulate the phase of light, while several different plasmonic structures are designed to control the amplitude and various polarization state distributions. We first introduce a type of detour phase meta-hologram composed of cross-shaped plasmonic nano-silt array which are sensitive to linear polarization with over 1000-nm bandwidth from visible to near-infrared. In a proof-of-concept experiment, we demonstrate 3D object reconstruction and polarization multiplexing images at various prescribed wavelengths from 473 nm to 1550 nm using a specially designed meta-hologram. Then we introduce another design of detour phase meta-hologram which is sensitive to circular polarizations. We choose a pair of oblique plasmonic nano-slits as a unit cell in the hologram, and modulate its polarization response by changing the distance between the two slits in a unit cell. We demonstrate that such design can be used for detecting both topological charge and polarization order of vortex vector beam, or generating holographic patterns with RGB colors. Benefiting from high controllability of amplitude, phase, and polarization, our meta-holograms offer great potential in future applications such as 3D displays, optical communications, and beam shaping.
Taking advantage of optical absorption imaging contrast, photoacoustic imaging technology is able to map the volumetric distribution of the optical absorption properties within biological tissues. Unfortunately, traditional piezoceramics-based transducers used in most photoacoustic imaging setups have inadequate frequency response, resulting in both poor depth resolution and inaccurate quantification of the optical absorption information. Instead of the piezoelectric ultrasonic transducer, we develop a graphene-based optical sensor for detecting photoacoustic pressure. The refractive index in the coupling medium is modulated due to photoacoustic pressure perturbation, which creates the variation of the polarization-sensitive optical absorption property of the graphene. As a result, the photoacoustic detection is realized through recording the reflectance intensity difference of polarization light. The graphene-based detector process an estimated noise-equivalentpressure (NEP) sensitivity of ~ 550 Pa over 20-MHz bandwidth with a nearby linear pressure response from 11.0 kPa to 53.0 kPa. Further, a graphene-based photoacoustic microscopy is built, and non-invasively reveals the microvascular anatomy in mouse ears label-freely.
We introduce non-parity-time-symmetric plasmonic waveguide-cavity systems, consisting of resonators with unbalanced gain and loss side-coupled to a waveguide. We show that the design parameters of such systems can be tuned to obtain exceptional points, and realize unidirectional reflectionless light propagation. We then propose a compact perfect absorber unit cell, based on unidirectional reflectionlessness at exceptional points. We show that with proper design, light can propagate into the perfect absorber unit cell with reflection close to zero in a broad wavelength range. By cascading multiple unit cell structures, near total light absorption can be achieved in a wide range of frequencies.
We design a non-parity-time-symmetric plasmonic waveguide-cavity system, consisting of two metal-dielectric-metal stub resonators side coupled to a metal-dielectric-metal waveguide, to form an exceptional point, and realize unidirectional reflectionless propagation at the optical communication wavelength. We also show that slow-light-enhanced ultra-compact plasmonic Mach-Zehnder interferometer sensors, in which the sensing arm consists of a waveguide system based on a plasmonic analogue of electromagnetically induced transparency, lead to an order of magnitude enhancement in the refractive index sensitivity compared to a conventional metal-dielectric-metal plasmonic waveguide sensor. Finally, we show that plasmonic coaxial waveguides offer a platform for practical implementation of plasmonic waveguide-cavity systems.
Recently, unidirectional reflectionlessness was demonstrated in classical photonic structures at optical exceptional points. Here we introduce a non-parity-time symmetric plasmonic waveguide-cavity device consisting of two metaldielectric- metal stub resonators side coupled to a metal-dielectric-metal waveguide. We tune the geometric parameters of the structure to obtain the exceptional point and realize unidirectional reflectionlessness at the optical communication wavelength. We investigate the properties of the plasmonic exceptional point as well as the associated physical effects of level repulsion, crossing and phase transition. We also show that by properly cascading the plasmonic waveguide-cavity structures we can design a wavelength-scale unidirectional plasmonic waveguide perfect absorber.
Bulk thermal emittance sources possess incoherent, isotropic, and broadband radiation spectra that vary from
material to material. However, these radiation spectra can be drastically altered by modifying the geometry of
the structures. In particular, several approaches have been proposed to achieve narrowband, highly directional
thermal emittance based on photonic crystals, gratings, textured metal surfaces, metamaterials, and shock waves
propagating through a crystal. Here we present optimized aperiodic structures for use as narrowband, highly
directional thermal infrared emitters for both TE and TM polarizations. One-dimensional layered structures
without texturing are preferable to more complex two- and three-dimensional structures because of the relative
ease and low cost of fabrication. These aperiodic multilayer structures designed with alternating layers of silicon
and silica on top of a semi-infinite tungsten substrate exhibit extremely high emittance peaked around the
wavelength at which the structures are optimized. Structures were designed by a genetic optimization algorithm
coupled to a transfer matrix code which computed thermal emittance. First, we investigate the properties of the
genetic-algorithm optimized aperiodic structures and compare them to a previously proposed resonant cavity
design. Second, we investigate a structure optimized to operate at the Wien wavelength corresponding to a
near-maximum operating temperature for the materials used in the aperiodic structure. Finally, we present a
structure that exhibits nearly monochromatic and highly directional emittance for both TE and TM polarizations
at the frequency of one of the molecular resonances of carbon monoxide (CO); hence, the design is suitable for
a detector of CO via absorption spectroscopy.
Resonant subwavelength plasmonic apertures can efficiently concentrate light into deep subwavelength regions, and
therefore significantly enhance the optical transmission through the apertures, or the absorption in the apertures. In
addition, grating structures, consisting of periodic arrays of grooves patterned on the metal film on both sides of a metal
aperture, are commonly used to enhance the coupling of incident light into the aperture through the excitation of surface
plasmons. For efficient surface plasmon excitation, however, the period of the grating has to be equal to the surface
plasmon wavelength, and several grating periods are required. Thus, such structures need to be several microns long. In
this paper, we show that a compact submicron structure consisting of multiple optical microcavities on both the entrance
and exit sides of a subwavelength plasmonic slit filled with an absorbing material can greatly enhance the absorption
cross section of the slit. We show that such microcavity structures can increase both the coupling of incident light into
the slit mode, as well as the resonant absorption enhancement in the slit by fine tuning the reflection coefficients at the
two sides of the slit. An optimized submicron structure consisting of two microcavities on each of the entrance and exit
sides of the slit leads to ~9.3 times absorption enhancement compared to an optimized slit without microcavities at the
optical communication wavelength of 1.55 microns. Finally, we show that multiple microcavity structures can also be
used to greatly enhance the coupling of free-space radiation into subwavelength plasmonic waveguides.
Plasmonic devices, based on surface plasmons propagating at metal-dielectric interfaces, have shown the potential to
manipulate light at deep subwavelength scales. One of the main challenges in plasmonics is achieving active control of
optical signals. In this paper, we introduce active plasmonic devices enhanced by waveguide dispersion engineering. We
consider plasmonic waveguide systems consisting of a metal-dielectric-metal waveguide (MDM) side-coupled to arrays
of MDM stub resonators. The MDM waveguide and stubs are filled with an active material whose absorption coefficient
can be modified with an external control beam. Such plasmonic waveguide systems can be engineered to support slowlight
modes. We find that, as the slowdown factor increases, the sensitivity of the effective index of the mode to
variations of the refractive index of the active material increases. Such slow-light enhancements of the sensitivity to
refractive index variations lead to enhanced performance of active plasmonic devices such as switches. To demonstrate
this, we consider absorption switches based on Fabry-Perot cavity structures, consisting of slow-light plasmonic
waveguide systems sandwiched between two conventional MDM waveguides. We find that increased slowdown factor
leads to increased induced change of the propagation length of the slow-light mode for a given refractive index variation,
and therefore to increased modulation depth. Compared to conventional MDM absorption switches, slow-light enhanced
switches achieve significantly higher modulation depth with moderate insertion loss. We use a scattering matrix theory
to account for the behavior of the devices which is in excellent agreement with numerical results obtained with the finitedifference
frequency-domain method.
Plasmonic devices, based on surface plasmons propagating at metal-dielectric interfaces, have shown the potential to
guide and manipulate light at deep subwavelength scales. In addition, slowing down light in plasmonic waveguides leads
to enhanced light-matter interaction, and could therefore enhance the performance of nanoscale plasmonic devices such
as switches and sensors. In this paper, we introduce slow-light subwavelength plasmonic waveguides based on a
plasmonic analogue of electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT). Both the operating wavelength range and the
slowdown factor of the waveguides are tunable. The structure consists of a periodic array of two metal-dielectric-metal
(MDM) stub resonators side-coupled to a MDM waveguide. The two cavities in each unit cell have a resonant frequency
separation which can be tuned by adjusting the cavity dimensions. We show that in the vicinity of the two cavity
resonant frequencies, the system supports three photonic bands, and the band diagram is similar to that of EIT systems.
The middle band corresponds to a mode with slow group velocity and zero group velocity dispersion in the middle of the
band. Decreasing the resonant frequency separation, increases the slowdown factor, and decreases the bandwidth of the
middle band. We also find that metal losses lead to a tradeoff between the slowdown factor and the propagation length of
the supported optical mode. We use a single-mode scattering matrix theory to account for the behavior of the
waveguides, and show that it is in excellent agreement with numerical results obtained with the finite-difference
frequency-domain method.
We theoretically investigate the effect of fabrication-related disorders on subwavelength metal-dielectric-metal
plasmonic waveguides. We use a Monte Carlo method to calculate the roughness-induced excess attenuation coefficient
with respect to a smooth waveguide. We find that the excess attenuation is mainly due to reflection from the rough
surfaces. For small roughness height (δ<4nm), the excess optical power loss due to disorder is small compared to the
material loss in a smooth waveguide. However, for large roughness height (δ>4nm), the excess attenuation increases
rapidly and the propagation length of the optical mode is severely affected. We also find that the disorder attenuation due
to reflection is maximized when the power spectral density of the disordered surfaces at the Bragg frequency is
maximized. Finally, we show that increasing the modal confinement or decreasing the guide wavelength, increase the
attenuation due to disorder.
We introduce extremely compact all-optical nonlinear switches based on Y-shaped plasmonic waveguides. We consider
a Y-shaped structure, consisting of a subwavelength metal-dielectric-metal input waveguide branch connected to two
metal-dielectric-metal output waveguide branches. The Y-shaped channel is embedded in a metallic film and filled with
a Kerr nonlinear material. We show that such a device can be designed to function as a switch between the two output
branches, controlled by the intensity of the incident light. We also show that the Y-shaped plasmonic structure can be
used as a tunable optical splitter.
We introduce a periodic plasmonic waveguiding structure which supports a guided subwavelength optical mode with
slow group velocity at a tunable wavelength range and with a tunable slowdown factor. The structure consists of a metal-dielectric-metal (MDM) waveguide side-coupled to a periodic array of MDM stub resonators. Both the MDM waveguide
and MDM stub resonators have deep subwavelength widths. We show that such a structure supports a guided optical
mode with slow group velocity. The wavelength range in which slow light propagation is achieved can be tuned by
adjusting the MDM stub resonator length and the periodicity of the structure. We also show that the slowdown factor
increases as the periodicity of the structure decreases, and that light can be slowed down by several orders of magnitude.
We find that there is a tradeoff between the slowdown factor and the propagation length of the supported optical mode.
In addition, for a given slowdown factor and operating wavelength, the propagation length of the optical mode in the
periodic plasmonic waveguide is much larger than the propagation length of the mode supported by a conventional
MDM waveguide, in which the slowdown factor can be tuned by adjusting the dielectric layer width. Finally, we show
that light can be coupled efficiently from a conventional MDM waveguide to such a periodic plasmonic waveguide. Such
slow-light plasmonic waveguides could be potentially used in nonlinear and sensing applications. We use a characteristic
impedance model and transmission line theory to account for their behavior.
We theoretically investigate the properties of absorption switches for metal-dielectric-metal (MDM) plasmonic
waveguides. We show that a MDM waveguide directly coupled to a cavity filled with an active material with tunable
absorption coefficient can act as an absorption switch, in which the on/off states correspond to the absence/presence of
optical pumping. We also show that a MDM plasmonic waveguide side-coupled to a cavity filled with an active material
can operate as an absorption switch, in which the on/off states correspond to the presence/absence of pumping. For a
specific modulation depth, the side-coupled-cavity switch results in more compact designs compared to the directcoupled-
cavity switch. Variations in the imaginary part of the refractive index of the material filling the cavity of
Δκ=0.01 (Δκ=0.15) result in ~60% (~99%) modulation depth. The properties of both switches can be accurately
described using transmission line theory.
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