Plasmonic Modes in Metal-Insulator-Metal Waveguide

Contacts:

Viktoriia Babicheva, DTU Fotonik, 4525-6883 (vbab@fotonik.dtu.dk)

Andrei Lavrinenko, DTU Fotonik, 4525-6392 (alav@fotonik.dtu.dk)

Surface plasmon polaritons at single interface.

Plasmonics is a booming focus area in nanophotonics with potential applications in sensing and integrated circuits.

Metal-insulator-metal waveguides have attracted particular attention for their ability to concentrate light to nanoscale dimensions. The high field intensity in the dielectric region makes these structures well-suited for small footprint active nanophotonic devices based on plasmonic structures.

(a) Metal-insulator-metal waveguide and (b) field distribution.

The project consists of:

1. Analysis of surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) at a single metal-insulator interface, see e.g. S. Maier, Plasmonics: Fundamentals and Applications, 2007

2. Derivation of the SPPs dispersion equation for a three-layer system, in particular metal-insulator-metal waveguide; and its numerical solving

3. Loss compensation in metal-insulator-metal waveguide by implementation of gain material

4. Numerical simulations of waveguides modes with commercial software CST Microwave Studio; comparison results with the analytic solutions

Depending on the students interests and progress the project can be extended to:

5. Deriving dispersion equation for a four-layer system, in particular metal-insulator-semiconductor-metal waveguide and its solution.