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Induced transparency by coupling of Tamm and defect states in tunable terahertz plasmonic crystals

Nature Photonics volume 7, pages 925–930 (2013)Cite this article

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Abstract

Photonic crystals and metamaterials have emerged as two classes of tailorable materials that enable the precise control of light. Plasmonic crystals, which can be thought of as photonic crystals fabricated from plasmonic materials, Bragg scatter incident electromagnetic waves from a repeated unit cell. However, plasmonic crystals, like metamaterials, are composed of subwavelength unit cells. Here, we study terahertz plasmonic crystals of several periods in a two-dimensional electron gas. This plasmonic medium is both extremely subwavelength (∼λ/100) and reconfigurable through the application of voltages to metal electrodes. Weakly localized crystal surface states known as Tamm states are observed. By introducing an independently controlled plasmonic defect that interacts with the Tamm states, we demonstrate a frequency-agile electromagnetically induced transparency phenomenon. The observed 50% in situ tuning of the plasmonic crystal band edges should be realizable in materials such as graphene to actively control plasmonic crystal dispersion in the infrared.

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Figure 1: Integrated plasmonic crystal structures.
Figure 2: Tunable plasmonic crystal spectrum.
Figure 3: Tamm states in plasmonic crystal defect structures.
Figure 4: Induced transparency in the first plasmonic bandgap.

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Acknowledgements

The work at Sandia National Laboratories was supported by the Department of Energy Office of Basic Energy Sciences. This work was performed, in part, at the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies, a US Department of Energy, Office of Basic Energy Sciences user facility. Sandia National Laboratories is a multi-program laboratory managed and operated by Sandia Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Lockheed Martin Corporation, for the US Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration (contract DE-AC04-94AL85000).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Sandia National Laboratories, PO Box 5800, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 87185, USA

    Gregory C. Dyer, Albert D. Grine, Don Bethke, John L. Reno & Eric A. Shaner

  2. Kingsborough College, The City University of New York, Brooklyn, New York, 11235, USA

    Gregory R. Aizin

  3. Institute for Terahertz Science and Technology, UC Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California, 93106, USA

    S. James Allen

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  1. Gregory C. Dyer
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Contributions

G.C.D., S.J.A. and E.A.S. conceived and designed the devices. J.L.R. grew the 2DEG material. E.A.S. and D.B. fabricated and imaged the devices. A.D.G. and G.C.D. assembled the experiment. G.C.D. measured and analysed the data. G.R.A. and G.C.D. developed the theory and performed the model computations. G.C.D. wrote the manuscript with editorial input from G.R.A. and E.A.S. All authors discussed the results and commented on the paper.

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Correspondence to Gregory C. Dyer or Eric A. Shaner.

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Dyer, G., Aizin, G., Allen, S. et al. Induced transparency by coupling of Tamm and defect states in tunable terahertz plasmonic crystals. Nature Photon 7, 925–930 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2013.252

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