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Graphene plasmonics for tunable terahertz metamaterials

Nature Nanotechnology volume 6, pages 630–634 (2011)Cite this article

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Abstract

Plasmons describe collective oscillations of electrons. They have a fundamental role in the dynamic responses of electron systems and form the basis of research into optical metamaterials1,2,3. Plasmons of two-dimensional massless electrons, as present in graphene, show unusual behaviour4,5,6,7 that enables new tunable plasmonic metamaterials8,9,10 and, potentially, optoelectronic applications in the terahertz frequency range8,9,11,12. Here we explore plasmon excitations in engineered graphene micro-ribbon arrays. We demonstrate that graphene plasmon resonances can be tuned over a broad terahertz frequency range by changing micro-ribbon width and in situ electrostatic doping. The ribbon width and carrier doping dependences of graphene plasmon frequency demonstrate power-law behaviour characteristic of two-dimensional massless Dirac electrons4,5,6. The plasmon resonances have remarkably large oscillator strengths, resulting in prominent room-temperature optical absorption peaks. In comparison, plasmon absorption in a conventional two-dimensional electron gas was observed only at 4.2 K (refs 13, 14). The results represent a first look at light–plasmon coupling in graphene and point to potential graphene-based terahertz metamaterials.

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Figure 1: Plasmon resonance in gated graphene micro-ribbon arrays.
Figure 2: Control of plasmon resonance through electrical gating and micro-ribbon width.
Figure 3: Scaling laws of graphene plasmon resonance frequency.
Figure 4: Simulation of plasmon excitations.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank R. Sagelman and B. Boudouris for providing the ion gel and X. Zhang for helpful discussions. This work was supported by an Office of Naval Research MURI award (N00014-09-1066 to L.J., J.H., C.G., A.Z. and F.W.) and the Office of Basic Energy Sciences, US Department of Energy (contract nos DE-AC02-05CH11231 for the Materials Science Division to Y.R.S. and F.W. and DE-AC02-05CH11231 for the Advanced Light Source). F.W. also acknowledges support from a Lucile and William Packard fellowship and a Hellman family fellowship, and L.J. acknowledges the support of a Lam fellowship.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, 94720, California, USA

    Long Ju, Baisong Geng, Jason Horng, Caglar Girit, Alex Zettl, Y. Ron Shen & Feng Wang

  2. Advanced Light Source Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, 94720, California, USA

    Michael Martin, Zhao Hao & Hans A. Bechtel

  3. Earth Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, 94720, California, USA

    Zhao Hao

  4. Molecular Foundry, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, 94720, California, USA

    Xiaogan Liang

  5. Materials Science Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, 94720, California, USA

    Alex Zettl, Y. Ron Shen & Feng Wang

  6. School of Physical Science and Technology, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, 730000, China

    Baisong Geng

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  1. Long Ju
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Contributions

F.W. and L.J. conceived the experiment. L.J. carried out optical measurements, B.G., J.H., X.L. and C.G. contributed to sample growth and fabrication, and L.J. and F.W. performed theoretical analysis. All authors discussed the results and wrote the paper.

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Correspondence to Feng Wang.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Ju, L., Geng, B., Horng, J. et al. Graphene plasmonics for tunable terahertz metamaterials. Nature Nanotech 6, 630–634 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2011.146

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