Funneling Light Through a Subwavelength Aperture with Epsilon-Near-Zero Materials

Abstract

Integration of the next generation of photonic structures with electronic and optical on-chip components requires the development of effective methods for confining and controlling light in subwavelength volumes. Several techniques enabling light coupling to sub-wavelength objects have recently been proposed, including grating-, and composite-based solutions. However, experi-mental realization of these couplers involves complex fabrication with \sim 10nm resolution in three dimensions. One promising alternative to complex coupling structures involves materials with vanishingly small dielectric permittivity, also known as epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) materials. In contrast to the previously referenced approaches, a single at layer of ENZ-material is expected to provide effcient coupling between free-space radiation and sub-wavelength guiding structures. Here we report the first direct observation of bulk-ENZ-enhanced transmission through a subwavelength slit, accompanied by a theoretical study of this phenomenon. Our study opens the door to multiple practical applications of ENZ materials and ENZ-based photonic systems.

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• Optical Cloaking with Non-Magnetic Metamaterials
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• Engineering Space for Light via Transformation Optics
• A spatially shifted beam approach to subwavelength focusing
• Hyper-gratings: nanophotonics in planar anisotropic metamaterials
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Cited by in corpus (19)

• Realization of an all-dielectric zero-index optical metamaterial
• Perfect Absorption in Ultrathin Epsilon-Near-Zero Metamaterials Induced by Fast-Wave Non-Radiative Modes
• Omnidirectionally Bending to the Normal in epsilon-near-Zero Metamaterials
• Experimental realization of epsilon-near-zero metamaterial slabs with metal-dielectric multilayers
• Enhanced Nonlinear Optical Responses of Layered Epsilon-Near-Zero Metamaterials at Visible Frequencies
• Epsilon-Near-Zero Response and Tunable Perfect Absorption in Weyl Semimetals
• Low-loss Zero-Index Materials
• Experimental demonstration of near-infrared epsilon-near-zero multilayer metamaterial slabs
• Double-zero-index structural waveguides
• Waveguide Modes in Weyl Semimetals with Tilted Dirac Cones
• Strain-Engineered Widely-Tunable Perfect Absorption Angle in Black Phosphorus from First-Principles
• Analytical Study of Sub-Wavelength Imaging by Uniaxial Epsilon-Near-Zero Metamaterial Slabs
• Disordered Zero-Index Metamaterials Based On Metal Induced Crystallization
• Plasmonic Metal Oxide Nanocrystals as Building Blocks for Infrared Metasurfaces
• Nanoscale Field Effect Optical Modulators Based on Depletion of Epsilon-Near-Zero Films
• One-Step Formation of Plasmonic Cu Nanodomains in p-Type Cu${}_2$O Matrix Films for Enhanced Photoconversion of n-ZnO/p-Cu${}_2$O Heterojunctions
• Engineering the point spread function of layered metamaterials
• Emergence of an Epsilon-Near-Zero Medium from Microscopic Atomic Principles
• Epsilon-Near-Zero Photonics Wires for Mid-Infrared Optical Lumped Circuitry