Abstract
We explore heat transfer and thermal characteristics of a wire-grid polarizer (WGP) on a microscale by investigating the effect of various geometrical parameters such as wire-grid period, height, and a fill factor. The thermal properties arise from heat transfer by light absorption and conduction in wire-grids. Fill factor was found to be the most dominant geometrical parameter. For TM polarized light, a higher fill factor with thicker wire-grids increased the temperature. The local temperature was found to rise up to Tmax = 354.5 K. TE polarization tended to produce lower temperature. Thermal extinction due to polarimetric extinction by a WGP was also evaluated and highest extinction was observed to be 4.78 dB, which represents a temperature difference ΔT = 54.3 °C. We expect the results to be useful for WGPs in polarization-sensitive thermal switching applications.
Highlights
IntroductionA wire-grid polarizer (WGP) is an optical element consisting of wire-grids: TE polarized light with an electric field aligned in an orientation parallel to the wire-grids drives a conduction current and produces Joule heating in the wire (absorption) or re-radiation in the backward direction (reflection)[1]
A wire-grid polarizer (WGP) is an optical element consisting of wire-grids: TE polarized light with an electric field aligned in an orientation parallel to the wire-grids drives a conduction current and produces Joule heating in the wire or re-radiation in the backward direction[1]
For thick WGPs with height on the order of several hundred nanometers, metal-dielectric-metal waveguide modes in the vertical direction may induce resonances and high absorption with TM polarized light incidence, the resonance may be weakened at small periods[58]
Summary
A wire-grid polarizer (WGP) is an optical element consisting of wire-grids: TE polarized light with an electric field aligned in an orientation parallel to the wire-grids drives a conduction current and produces Joule heating in the wire (absorption) or re-radiation in the backward direction (reflection)[1]. As WGP structure finds increasingly more applications on a micro and nanoscale, thermal characteristics become extremely important to understand, because light energy can give rise to thermal fluctuations and, thereby, affect the performance of devices that are integrated to a WGP For this reason, thermal properties have drawn significant interests in nanoscale optical devices, such as metal and dielectric nanorods[40,41] and plasmonic nanospheres[42]. For applications as a polarizing element in an optical set-up and when a WGP is integrated as a part of a device or a package, e.g., grating wire-grids used as a biosensing substrate on which molecular interactions may be measured[48,49,50,51], the thermal distribution on a WGP may affect the biosensor performance and, exact understanding of thermal characteristics of a WGP is vital. Polarization-dependent thermal stimulus may be used to develop a new tool for cell-based assays in biomedical applications using thermal “hot” spots to turn on or off molecular processes or an electronic device that can be thermally switched to control and modulate heat transfer electronically with improved functional characteristics
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