Influence of symmetry breaking degrees on surface plasmon polaritons propagation in branched silver nanowire waveguides.

Jiaojiao Hua,Wenhui Wang,Zhongfeng Xu,Fan Wu

doi:10.1038/srep34418

Abstract

Surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs)-based nanowire (NW) waveguides demonstrate promising potentials in the integrated nanophotonic circuits and devices. The realization of controlling SPPs propagation in NWs is significant for the performance of nanophotonic devices when employed for special function. In this work, we report the effect of symmetry breaking degrees on SPPs propagation behavior in manually fabricated branched silver NW structures. The symmetry breaking degree can be tuned by the angle between main NW and branch NW, which influences the emissions at the junction and the main NW terminal in a large extent. Our results illustrate the significance of symmetry breaking degree on SPPs propagation in NW-based waveguides which is crucial for designing the future nanophotonic circuits.

Highlights

Manipulation of light at subwavelength scale is crucial for the development of highly integrated nanophotonic devices[1,2]
Sun et al.[33,34,35] reported that the surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) can be scattered into photons at the position of NP, which can be used for the remote excitation in the nanophotonic circuits
It is interesting to note that there exists a minimum value in the emission intensity when changing symmetry breaking degree

Summary

Introduction

Manipulation of light at subwavelength scale is crucial for the development of highly integrated nanophotonic devices[1,2] Due to their unique ability to concentrate light into nanoscale regions[3,4,5,6,7], surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) which are the collective oscillation of free electrons with electromagnetic waves at the metal/dielectric interface[8] have drawn increasing interest at various fields, such as super-resolution imaging[9,10], nanolaser[11,12], nanoantenna[13,14] and resonators[15,16]. Our experimental results give a preliminary relationship between symmetry breaking degree and emission intensity in SPPs-based NW waveguides, which is instructive to the design and fabrication of future nanophotonic circuits and devices

Methods

Results

Conclusion