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Active tuning of surface phonon polariton resonances via carrier photoinjection

Nature Photonics volume 12, pages 50–56 (2018)Cite this article

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Abstract

Surface phonon polaritons (SPhPs) are attractive alternatives to infrared plasmonics for subdiffractional confinement of infrared light. Localized SPhP resonances in semiconductor nanoresonators are narrow, but that linewidth and the limited extent of the Reststrahlen band limit spectral coverage. To address this limitation, we report active tuning of SPhP resonances in InP and 4H-SiC by photoinjecting free carriers into nanoresonators, taking advantage of the coupling between the carrier plasma and optic phonons to blueshift SPhP resonances. We demonstrate state-of-the-art tuning figures of merit upon continuous-wave excitation (in InP) or pulsed excitation (in 4H-SiC). Lifetime effects cause the tuning to saturate in InP, and carrier redistribution leads to rapid (<50 ps) recovery of the resonance in 4H-SiC. This work demonstrates the potential for this method and opens a path towards actively tuned nanophotonic devices, such as modulators and beacons, in the infrared, and identifies important implications of coupling between electronic and phononic excitations.

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Fig. 1: Steady-state spectroscopy of InP and SiC nanopillar arrays.
Fig. 2: Continuous-wave carrier tuning of InP nanopillar array.
Fig. 3: Transient reflection spectroscopy of SiC nanopillar arrays.
Fig. 4: Time dependence of resonance recovery of 4H-SiC nanopillar array.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank M. Ancona for discussions. A.D.D., C.T.E. and A.J.G. acknowledge support from the National Research Council (NRC)–NRL Postdoctoral Fellowship and Karles Fellowship programmes. This work was funded via the Office of Naval Research through the Nanoscience Institute at the US Naval Research Laboratory.

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Author notes

  1. Adam D. Dunkelberger and Chase T. Ellis contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. US Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC, USA

    Adam D. Dunkelberger, Chase T. Ellis, Daniel C. Ratchford, Alexander J. Giles, Chul Soo Kim, Igor Vurgaftman, Joseph G. Tischler, James P. Long, Orest J. Glembocki, Jeffrey C. Owrutsky & Joshua D. Caldwell

  2. Sotera Defense Solutions, Inc., Columbia, MD, USA

    Mijin Kim

  3. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA

    Joshua D. Caldwell

  4. Applied Physics Division, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Boulder, CO, USA

    Bryan T. Spann

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Contributions

J.P.L., I.V., J.D.C., J.C.O. and O.J.G. devised the original concept. A.D.D., C.T.E., J.C.O., J.G.T., J.P.L., O.J.G. and J.D.C. devised the experiment. A.J.G., M.K. and C.S.K. fabricated the samples. A.D.D. and B.T.S. carried out the transient reflectance measurements on SiC nanopillars under the direction of J.C.O. and D.C.R. modelled the results. C.T.E. and J.G.T. carried out the steady-state reflectance measurements on InP nanopillars and I.V. modelled the results. C.T.E. and O.J.G. performed the finite-element method simulations. The project was supervised by J.G.T., J.C.O. and J.D.C.

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Correspondence to Joshua D. Caldwell.

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Supplementary results and analysis; Supplementary Figures 1–11; Supplementary Table 1.

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Dunkelberger, A.D., Ellis, C.T., Ratchford, D.C. et al. Active tuning of surface phonon polariton resonances via carrier photoinjection. Nature Photon 12, 50–56 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41566-017-0069-0

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