Ultrafast All-Optical Light Control with Tamm Plasmons in Photonic Nanostructures

Abstract

Ultrafast all-optical modulators are crucial parts of prospective photonic devices. A number of plasmonic and dielectric nanostructures were nominated as candidates for integrated all-optical circuits. The key principle in the design of such devices is to engineer artificial optical resonances to increase the magnitude of modulation or to change the characteristic switching time. The major drawback is that the manufacturing becomes rather sophisticated. Here, we propose a method to tailor the ultrafast response of photonic crystal–metal nanostructures by employing a spectral shift of the Tamm-plasmon resonance. We show that for the absorbed pump fluence of 6 pJ reflectance of the sample at the near-infrared probe wavelength in the vicinity of the Tamm-plasmon resonance changes 25× stronger as compared with a bare metal film. Additionally, we show that by choosing a proper wavelength around the resonance a background-free reflectance modulation can be achieved. The characteristic pulse-limited switching time, in this case, is 150 fs.

Untargeted effects in organic exciton–polariton transient spectroscopy: A cautionary tale

“…Indeed, the transient response of such purely photonic structures is well characterized. 78,79 Here, the dominant effect is likely pumpinduced changes to the refractive index of the metallic mirrors, similar to suggestions using TIPSpentacene microcavities. 63 Similar effects can be obtained within organic films, as reported for instance from a PMMA waveguide mode not coupled to any electronic excitations.…”

“…The parameters considered in this analysis are as follows: 1) reduction in organic dye layer absorption, to replicate the effect of ground-state bleaching; 2) thickness of the organic layer (keeping the total film absorption constant), to capture thermal expansion; and background refractive index changes in 3) the organic polymer matrix and 4) the mirror material (metal or dielectric), in accord with previous transient studies on photonic structures. 78,79 Within this scheme we only calculate steady-state optical properties; our assumption is that any spectral dynamics arise from the mechanism of the underlying effect. For instance, within the twotemperature model of Liu et al, the <10 ps dynamics in microcavity transient reflectivity could be predominantly described by carrier thermalization.…”

“…63 Similar dynamics are reported for hot carrier cooling in other photonic structures. 78,79 Ground-state bleaching should roughly follow the dynamics of the bare film, resulting in persistent signatures on the order of nanoseconds. These effects span the sub-ps to ns timescale and could easily be reconciled with our measured dynamics.…”

Coupling Mechanism between Tamm Plasmon Polaritons and Monolayer WS2 Embedded in Metal/Dielectric Bragg Reflector Hybrid Architecture

“…Coupling of TPPs with other resonance modes holds unique Rabi splitting which can be employed to manipulate the resonance wavelength and navigate the design of artificial microconfigurations [5,6] . Thus far, the easily realizable TPPs promise great potential in optical sensors [7,8] , solar cells [9] , plasmonic filter [10] , ultrafast all-optical modulator [11] , and so forth.…”

Chiral Optical Tamm States at the Interface between an All-Dielectric Polarization-Preserving Anisotropic Mirror and a Cholesteric Liquid Crystal

“…OTSs have found application in various optical devices with new ways to control light. Modern technologies offer a great number of structures which allow obtaining OTSs using various optical materials and metamaterials including chiral, nonlinear, resonant, nanocomposite, and anisotropic ones [4][5][6][7]. Theoretically and experimentally investigated directional surface waves, called Dyakonov surface waves, are supported at the interface of dielectric uniaxial birefringent media based on a modified Otto-Kretchmann configuration [8,9].…”