Design and investigation of N-type metal/insulator/semiconductor/metal structure two-port electro-plasmonic addressed routing switch.

Abstract

Relying on the new field of technology, plasmonics, we have proposed and investigated an N-type metal/insulator/semiconductor/metal (MISM)-based 1×2 plasmonic routing switch. However, the MISM structure has a 50 nm thick silicon core waveguide accompanied by a thin-film HfO(2) gate insulator, the electro-plasmonic addressing of the structure guides and routes the surface plasmon polaritons on a subwavelength regime. FEM-based electromagnetic simulations are prepared at a telecom wavelength of λ=1550 nm. Considering large electron concentration densities accumulated near the semiconductor/oxide interface, this switch presents extinction ratios of above 9 dB beside insertion losses of almost only -2 dB in competition with other plasmonic counterparts. Thus, the proposed compact and high-speed routing structure, featuring a minimum 1.1 μm waveguide length and the possibility of CMOS-compatible integrating, can be a well-engineered option for merging electronics and photonics on the same layout to sustain a speedier and more complicated optical network and integrated system-on-chips.