Single nanowire ultrafast optical modulation and correlation

Abstract

Integration of miniaturized elements has been a major driving force behind modern ultrafast photonics. Nanowires have emerged as potential building blocks for compact photonic circuits and devices in nanophotonics. We demonstrate here ultrafast optical modulation and correlation on the single-nanowire scale. Based on saturable absorption in graphene films, we show ultrafast optical modulation in a graphene flakes doped polymer nanofiber and graphene film coated ZnO nanowire. Also, based on imaging the transverse second harmonic generation (TSHG) from a cadmium sulfide (CdS) and a CdTe nanowires, as well as converting the TSHG spatial image into the temporal profile of the pulses, we demonstrate ultrafast optical correlation with pulse energy down to femto-joules.