The unprecedented ability of nanometallic (that is, plasmonic) structures to concentrate light into deep-subwavelength volumes has propelled their use in a vast array of nanophotonics technologies and research endeavours. Plasmonic light concentrators can elegantly interface diffraction-limited dielectric optical components with nanophotonic structures. Passive and active plasmonic devices provide new pathways to generate, guide, modulate and detect light with structures that are similar in size to state-of-the-art electronic devices. With the ability to produce highly confined optical fields, the conventional rules for light-matter interactions need to be re-examined, and researchers are venturing into new regimes of optical physics. In this review we will discuss the basic concepts behind plasmonics-enabled light concentration and manipulation, make an attempt to capture the wide range of activities and excitement in this area, and speculate on possible future directions.

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Plasmonics for extreme light concentration and manipulation.

Recent years have seen a rapid expansion of research into nanophotonics based on surface plasmon–polaritons. These electromagnetic waves propagate along metal–dielectric interfaces and can be guided by metallic nanostructures beyond the diffraction limit. This remarkable capability has unique prospects for the design of highly integrated photonic signal-processing systems, nanoresolution optical imaging techniques and sensors. This Review summarizes the basic principles and major achievements of plasmon guiding, and details the current state-of-the-art in subwavelength plasmonic waveguides, passive and active nanoplasmonic components for the generation, manipulation and detection of radiation, and configurations for the nanofocusing of light. Potential future developments and applications of nanophotonic devices and circuits are also discussed, such as in optical signals processing, nanoscale optical devices and near-field microscopy with nanoscale resolution.

Plasmonics beyond the diffraction limit

The term photonic crystals appears because of the analogy between electron waves in crystals and the light waves in artificial periodic dielectric structures. During the recent years the investigation of one-, two-and three-dimensional periodic structures has attracted a widespread attention of the world optics community because of great potentiality of such structures in advanced applied optical fields. The interest in periodic structures has been stimulated by the fast development of semiconductor technology that now allows the fabrication of artificial structures, whose period is comparable with the wavelength of light in the visible and infrared ranges.

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/6354/16969/00781867.pdf

Photonic crystals

Metamaterials are artificially engineered structures that have properties, such as a negative refractive index, not attainable with naturally occurring materials. Negative-index metamaterials (NIMs) were first demonstrated for microwave frequencies, but it has been challenging to design NIMs for optical frequencies and they have so far been limited to optically thin samples because of significant fabrication challenges and strong energy dissipation in metals. Such thin structures are analogous to a monolayer of atoms, making it difficult to assign bulk properties such as the index of refraction. Negative refraction of surface plasmons was recently demonstrated but was confined to a two-dimensional waveguide. Three-dimensional (3D) optical metamaterials have come into focus recently, including the realization of negative refraction by using layered semiconductor metamaterials and a 3D magnetic metamaterial in the infrared frequencies; however, neither of these had a negative index of refraction. Here we report a 3D optical metamaterial having negative refractive index with a very high figure of merit of 3.5 (that is, low loss). This metamaterial is made of cascaded 'fishnet' structures, with a negative index existing over a broad spectral range. Moreover, it can readily be probed from free space, making it functional for optical devices. We construct a prism made of this optical NIM to demonstrate negative refractive index at optical frequencies, resulting unambiguously from the negative phase evolution of the wave propagating inside the metamaterial. Bulk optical metamaterials open up prospects for studies of 3D optical effects and applications associated with NIMs and zero-index materials such as reversed Doppler effect, superlenses, optical tunnelling devices, compact resonators and highly directional sources.

Three-dimensional optical metamaterial with a negative refractive index

Biocompatibility, Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Applications L. Harivardhan Reddy,†,‡ Jose ́ L. Arias, Julien Nicolas,† and Patrick Couvreur*,† †Laboratoire de Physico-Chimie, Pharmacotechnie et Biopharmacie, Universite ́ Paris-Sud XI, UMR CNRS 8612, Faculte ́ de Pharmacie, IFR 141, 5 rue Jean-Baptiste Cleḿent, F-92296 Chat̂enay-Malabry, France Departamento de Farmacia y Tecnología Farmaceútica, Facultad de Farmacia, Campus Universitario de Cartuja s/n, Universidad de Granada, 18071 Granada, Spain ‡Pharmaceutical Sciences Department, Sanofi, 13 Quai Jules Guesdes, F-94403 Vitry-sur-Seine, France

Magnetic nanoparticles: design and characterization, toxicity and biocompatibility, pharmaceutical and biomedical applications.

Metal heterostructures constructed surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) Bragg reflectors and nanocavities on flat metallic surfaces are proposed and demonstrated numerically. A metal heterowaveguide structured by alternately stacking two kinds of metal gap waveguides (MGWs) shows periodically effective refraction index modulation to SPPs and produces SPP propagation on flat metallic surfaces a band gap in certain frequencies, known as plasmonic band gap, in which SPP propagation is forbidden. Changing the width of one MGW in the heterowaveguide, a SPP nanocavity with high quality factor can be created. Our results imply a broad possibility of constructed SPP-based Bragg reflectors, emitter, and filters, etc., on flat metallic surfaces for planar nanometeric photonic networks.

Plasmon Bragg reflectors and nanocavities on flat metallic surfaces

Based on finite-difference time-domain simulation of the propagation characteristics of surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) in optical circuits made from metal gap waveguides (MGWs) with nanometric gap widths, we theoretically demonstrate that two structures that consist of splitting and recombining MGWs and of coupling MGWs can be used as nanoscale Mach–Zehnder interferometers. MGW arrays show capabilities for array imaging and for controlling the flow of SPPs. Other potential applications of coupling MGWs, as SPP switches, directional couplers, and even as a nanoscale counterpart for observing linear and nonlinear dynamic behavior of electromagnetic fields, are also predicted and discussed. Our results point to an interesting way to manipulate optical signals and provide efficient sensing in nanophotonic architectures.

Surface plasmon polariton propagation in nanoscale metal gap waveguides.

In this Letter, we introduce a simple metal waveguide array for realizing all-angle wide frequency bandwidth negative refraction from the visible to infrared frequencies. Theoretical analysis from the rigorous coupled-wave theory reveals that the negative coupling constant resulting from the anomalous coupling of guided surface plasmon polariton modes contributes to the negative refraction. The analytical results are confirmed by finite-difference time-domain numerical simulations. Our result provides an alternative way to construct robust all-angle negative refractive materials operating in a wide range of frequency from the near-infrared to the visible range.

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All-angle broadband negative refraction of metal waveguide arrays in the visible range: theoretical analysis and numerical demonstration.

We demonstrate an approach for easy fabrication of two-dimensional (2D) hexagonal and three-dimensional (3D) face-centered-cubic (fcc)-type photonic crystal (PhC) microstructures in a photosensitive polymer by applying a simple single refracting prism. This prism enables the splitting and recombining of a single incoming laser beam to form multiple-beam interference pattern simultaneously. Thus, antivibration equipment and complicated optical alignment system are not required, leading to a much more simple optical setup than previously reported laser holographic lithography techniques. Large-scale (over 1cm2) 2D hexagonal and 3D fcc-type PhCs have been produced. Reflection/transmission measurements performed on the fabricated 3D fcc-type PhC structures agree well with the corresponding band structure calculation.

Fabrication of large area two- and three-dimensional polymer photonic crystals using single refracting prism holographic lithography

We theoretically demonstrate that a metallic film covered by a dielectric grating of graded thickness can strongly slow light as the propagation velocities of surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) are reduced over a large frequency bandwidth at visible frequencies. Since the dispersive relation of SPPs is dependent on the dielectric grating thickness, the guided SPPs at different frequencies can be localized at different spatial positions of the plasmonic grating. We numerically demonstrate that a true rainbow from violet to red colors can be separately localized, resulting in the spatial separation of the visible spectrum on a chip.

Guo Ping Wang

Papers

Plasmon Bragg reflectors and nanocavities on flat metallic surfaces

Surface plasmon polariton propagation in nanoscale metal gap waveguides.

All-angle broadband negative refraction of metal waveguide arrays in the visible range: theoretical analysis and numerical demonstration.

Fabrication of large area two- and three-dimensional polymer photonic crystals using single refracting prism holographic lithography

Trapping of surface-plasmon polaritons in a graded Bragg structure: Frequency-dependent spatially separated localization of the visible spectrum modes