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Designed ultrafast optical nonlinearity in a plasmonic nanorod metamaterial enhanced by nonlocality

Nature Nanotechnology volume 6, pages 107–111 (2011)Cite this article

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Abstract

All-optical signal processing enables modulation and transmission speeds not achievable using electronics alone1,2. However, its practical applications are limited by the inherently weak nonlinear effects that govern photon–photon interactions in conventional materials, particularly at high switching rates3. Here, we show that the recently discovered nonlocal optical behaviour of plasmonic nanorod metamaterials4 enables an enhanced, ultrafast, nonlinear optical response. We observe a large (80%) change of transmission through a subwavelength thick slab of metamaterial subjected to a low control light fluence of 7 mJ cm−2, with switching frequencies in the terahertz range. We show that both the response time and the nonlinearity can be engineered by appropriate design of the metamaterial nanostructure. The use of nonlocality to enhance the nonlinear optical response of metamaterials, demonstrated here in plasmonic nanorod composites, could lead to ultrafast, low-power all-optical information processing in subwavelength-scale devices.

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Figure 1: Plasmonic nanorod metamaterial and its optical properties.
Figure 2: Modifications of the optical properties of the metamaterial under control light illumination.
Figure 3: Intensity, spectral and angular dependences of the transient optical response of the metamaterial.

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Acknowledgements

The work of G.A.W., R.P., W.H. and A.V.Z. was supported by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) (UK). G.P.W. and D.J.G. were supported through the Center for Nanoscale Materials by the US Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences (contract no. DE-AC02-06CH11357). The work of V.A.P. was supported by the National Science Foundation (ECCS-0724763) and the Office of Naval Research (N00014-07-1-0457).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, University of North Florida, Jacksonville, 32224, Florida, USA

    G. A. Wurtz

  2. Centre for Nanostructured Media, The Queen's University of Belfast, Belfast, BT7 1NN, UK

    R. Pollard & W. Hendren

  3. Center for Nanoscale Materials, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, 60439, Illinois, USA

    G. P. Wiederrecht & D. J. Gosztola

  4. Department of Physics and Applied Physics, University of Massachusetts, Lowell, 01854, Massachusetts, USA

    V. A. Podolskiy

  5. Department of Physics, King's College London, Strand, London, WC2R 2LS, UK

    A. V. Zayats

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  1. G. A. Wurtz
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Contributions

G.A.W. and A.V.Z. conceived and designed the experiments. G.A.W., G.P.W. and D.J.G. performed the experiments. R.P. and W.H. fabricated samples. G.A.W. G.P.W., V.A.P. and A.V.Z. analysed the data and co-wrote the paper. All authors discussed the results and commented on the manuscript.

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Correspondence to A. V. Zayats.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Wurtz, G., Pollard, R., Hendren, W. et al. Designed ultrafast optical nonlinearity in a plasmonic nanorod metamaterial enhanced by nonlocality. Nature Nanotech 6, 107–111 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2010.278

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