Ultrafast control of surface plasmon propagation

Description/Abstract

Excitation of an aluminium/dielectric plasmonic waveguide with 200 fs optical pulses leads to the transient modulation of surface plasmon-polariton (SPP) signals propagating in the waveguide. We show that by tuning the excitation wavelength to aluminium's interband absorption peak at ~810 nm, a modulation depth of more than 35% can be achieved at an excitation fluence of 13 mJ/cm^2. We also consider issues relevant to the propagation of short SPP pulses in a range of metal/dielectric waveguides.