Multipolar interference effects in nanophotonics

Abstract

Scattering of electromagnetic waves by an arbitrary nanoscale object can be characterized by a multipole decomposition of the electromagnetic field that allows to describe the scattering intensity and radiation pattern through interferences of dominating excited multipole modes. In modern nanophotonics, both generation and interference of multipole modes start to play an indispensable role, and they enable nanoscale manipulation of light with many related applications. Here we review the multipolar interference effects in metallic, metal-dielectric, and dielectric nanostructures, and suggest a comprehensive view on many phenomena involving the interferences of electric, magnetic and toroidal multipoles, which drive a number of recently discussed effects in nanophotonics such as unidirectional scattering, effective optical antiferromagnetism, generalized Kerker scattering with controlled angular patterns, generalized Brewster angle, and nonradiating optical anapoles. We further discuss other types of possible multipolar interference effects not yet exploited in literature and envisage the prospect of achieving more flexible and advanced nanoscale control of light relying on the concepts of multipolar interference through full phase and amplitude engineering.

Invited review article to appear in "The New Horizons in Nanophotonics" issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A

References in corpus (6)

• Topological Photonics
• Two-Dimensional Material Nanophotonics
• Multipolar nonlinear nanophotonics
• Ultra-directional forward scattering by individual core-shell nanoparticles
• Interplay of magnetic responses in all-dielectric oligomers to realize magnetic Fano resonances
• Invisible nanowires with interfering electric and toroidal dipoles

Cited by in corpus (2)

• Generalized magnetic mirrors
• Beam steering with dielectric metalattices