Light Fields at the Nanoscale

Professor L.(Kobus) Kuipers

FOM Institute AMOLF, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

2:30 pm Monday, 30 January 2012, EN101 Lecture Theatre (EN Building), Hawthorn.

Manipulating light at the nanoscale forms the central theme of nanophotonics. Metal nanostructures can exert a huge control over light at the nanoscale. We have succeeded to efficiently trap light on gold nanowires as thin as 40 nm by exciting a Sommerfeld-like plasmon mode [1]. Using a phasesensitive,
polarization-sensitive near-field microscope we are able to nail down the symmetry of the mode and characterize its propagation losses [2]. Interestingly, the near-field probe used is also a metallic nanostructure. We have used its cylindrical symmetry to induce a light-matter interaction mediated by the magnetic field rather than by the electric field, which usually dominates light-matter interaction at optical frequencies. The circular current induced by the magnetic field impinging on the metallic ring in effect results in a “diamagnetic” light matter interaction which allowed the tuning of the resonance frequency of a photonic crystal nanocavity [3]. Through a slight modification of the symmetry of the near-field probe, we were able to visualize the magnetic field in a photonic waveguide for the first time [4]. Coherent control of surface plasmon excitation enables the creation of plasmonic “hot spots” at arbitrary positions [5].

1. E. Verhagen, M. Spasenović, A. Polman and, L. Kuipers, Phys. Rev. Lett. 102, 203904 (2009).
2. D.J. Dikken, M. Spasenović, E. Verhagen, D. van Oosten and L. Kuipers, Opt. Express 18, 16112-16119 (2010)
3. M. Burresi, T. Kampfrath, D. van Oosten, J.C. Prangsma, B.-S. Song, S. Noda and L. Kuipers, Phys. Rev. Lett.
105, 123901 (2010).
4. M. Burresi, D. van Oosten, T. Kampfrath, H. Schoenmaker, R. Heideman, A. Leinse and L. Kuipers, Science 326,
550-553 (2009).
5. B. Gjonaj, J. Aulbach, P.M. Johnson, A.P. Mosk, L. Kuipers and A. Lagendijk, Nature Photon. 5, 360-363 (2011).

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