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Efficient Unidirectional Launching of Surface Plasmons by Multi-Groove Structures

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Abstract

Efficiency is an important criterion in developing a practical surface-plasmon-polariton (SPP) unidirectional launcher. In this paper, we show that multi-groove structures can efficiently launch SPPs by numerically optimizing structural parameters and normal incident light. Experimentally, a high efficiency of 58.4 % is demonstrated in a six-groove structure with a lateral dimension of 3.9 μm. For a three-groove structure with even smaller lateral dimension of 1.35 μm, the efficiency presents a broadband response, which remains higher than 42 % from 720 to 860 nm. The proposed multi-groove structures with high SPP launching efficiency and small size exhibit potential in highly integrated plasmonic circuits.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the National Basic Research Program of China (Grant No. 2013CB328704) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 61475002 and 61435001).

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Correspondence to Huimin Liao or Zhi Li.

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Yimu Bao and Hao Liang contributed equally to the work.

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Bao, Y., Liang, H., Liao, H. et al. Efficient Unidirectional Launching of Surface Plasmons by Multi-Groove Structures. Plasmonics 12, 1425–1430 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11468-016-0402-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11468-016-0402-3

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