Final Report Summary - IPLASMM (Frontiers in nanophotonics: integrated plasmonic metamaterials devices)
Controlling photonic processes on length scales below the diffraction limit requires structural elements with dimensions much smaller than the wavelength of light. In this respect, plamsonic metamaterials open up new opportunities for engineering light-matter interactions and have numerous applications in modern optical technologies. In this project, we focus on the development and investigation of hyperbolic metamaterials based on plasmonic nanorod arrays. Plasmonic metamaterials based on arrays of aligned metal nanorods were designed to behave as anisotropic dielectrics or metals with the effective bulk plasma frequency depending on the structural parameters and constituent materials. These metamaterials provide a flexible platform with tuneable epsilon-near-zero behaviour across the UV, visible and infrared spectral ranges. The project has studied linear and nonlinear optical processes mediated by such metamaterials with the aim to integrate the metamaterials in a nanophotonic circuitry for achieving active functionality. Applications of such metamaterials in development of active nanoscale waveguides, hyperbolic polaritonic crystals, label-free bio- and chemical sensors, controlling spontaneous emission, and designing on-demand nonlinear response were developed and studied in details. The results show unprecedented flexibility in the tuneable design of optical response and functional characteristics, such as
refractive index sensitivity, fluorescent rate enhancement in the integrated photonic and optofluidic circuits and design of on-demand nonlinear response in the desired spectral range.
refractive index sensitivity, fluorescent rate enhancement in the integrated photonic and optofluidic circuits and design of on-demand nonlinear response in the desired spectral range.