Absolute chiral sensing in dielectric metasurfaces with signal reversals

Abstract

Sensing molecular chirality at the nanoscale has been a long-standing challenge due to the inherently weak nature of chiroptical signals, and nanophotonic approaches have proven fruitful in accessing these signals. However, in most cases, absolute chiral sensing of the total chiral refractive index has not been possible, while the strong inherent signals from the nanostructures themselves obscure the weak chiroptical signals. Here, we propose a dielectric metamaterial system that overcomes these limitations and allows for absolute measurements of the total chirality, and the possibility for a crucial signal reversal that enables chirality measurements without the need for sample removal. As proof of principle, we demonstrate signal-enhancements by a factor of 200 for ultrathin, sub-wavelength, chiral samples over a uniform and accessible area.

5 pages, 4 figures

References in corpus (3)

• Electromagnetically Induced Transparency and Absorption in Metamaterials: The Radiating Two-Oscillator Model and Its Experimental Confirmation
• Evanescent-wave and open-air chiral sensing via signal-reversing cavity-enhanced polarimetry
• Chiral sensing with achiral isotropic metasurfaces

Cited by in corpus (7)

• Nanophotonic chiral sensing: How does it actually work?
• On enhanced sensing of chiral molecules in optical cavities
• Chiral sensing with achiral isotropic metasurfaces
• Reconfigurable chirality with achiral excitonic materials in the strong-coupling regime
• Chiral sensing with achiral anisotropic metasurfaces
• Chirality sensing employing PT-symmetric and other resonant gain-loss optical systems
• Optimal circular dichroism sensing with quantum light: Multi-parameter estimation approach