Enhanced optical forces in integrated hybrid plasmonic waveguides

Abstract

We demonstrate gradient optical forces in metal-dielectric hybrid plasmonic waveguides (HPWG) for the first time. The magnitude of optical force is quantified through excitation of the nanomechanical vibration of the suspended waveguides. Integrated Mach-Zehnder interferometry is utilized to transduce the mechanical motion and characterize the propagation loss of the HPWG. Compared with theory, the experimental results have confirmed the optical force enhancement, but also suggested a significantly higher optical loss in HPWG. The excessive loss is attributed to metal surface roughness and other non-idealities in the device fabrication process.