Design and Simulation of an All-Optical Plasmonic Fano Switch

Abstract

The optical switch is a crucial component in optical communications that plays an important role in transmitting the optical signal within a photonic circuit. In this paper, an all-optical plasmonic switch composed of five nanodisks made from gold, planted inside SiO <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">z</sub> substrate, based on Fano resonance, has been proposed. The simulation results disclose that the structure can work as an infrared optical switch by adjusting the pump light at 825 nm wavelength. The occurrence of the second Fano resonance (FR) due to the reduction in the distance between nanodisks was reviewed. The two-dimensional simulations using the finite-difference time-domain algorithm are utilized to reveal apparent optical bistability and notable switching mechanism of the signal light. The results show -4.00 dB and -36.84 dB transmissions when the pump is OFF and ON, respectively. As known, in highly integrated optical communication, ultra-small all-optical switches are of great importance. This switch has a nanoscale size of 450 nm×450 nm.