No Arabic abstract
Epitaxial graphene mesas and ribbons are investigated using terahertz (THz) nearfield microscopy to probe surface plasmon excitation and THz transmission properties on the sub-wavelength scale. The THz near-field images show variation of graphene properties on a scale smaller than the wavelength, and excitation of THz surface waves occurring at graphene edges, similar to that observed at metallic edges. The Fresnel reflection at the substrate SiC/air interface is also found to be altered by the presence of graphene ribbon arrays, leading to either reduced or enhanced transmission of the THz wave depending on the wave polarization and the ribbon width.
We study the spectra and damping of surface plasmon-polaritons in double graphene layer structures. It is shown that application of bias voltage between layers shifts the edge of plasmon absorption associated with the interband transitions. This effect could be used in efficient plasmonic modulators. We reveal the influence of spatial dispersion of conductivity on plasmonic spectra and show that it results in the shift of cutoff frequency to the higher values.
Interactions between localized plasmons in proximal nanostructures is a well-studied phenomenon. Here we explore plasmon plasmon interactions in connected extended systems. Such systems can now be easily produced using graphene. Specifically we employ the finite element method to study such interactions in graphene nanoribbon arrays with a periodically modulated electrochemical potential or number of layers. We find a rich variation in the resulting plasmonic resonances depending on the dimensions and the electrochemical potentials (doping) of the nanoribbon segments and the involvement of transverse and longitudinal plasmon interactions. Unlike predictions based of the well-known orbital hybridization model, the energies of the resulting hybrid plasmonic resonances of the extended system can lie between the energies of the plasmons of the individual components. The results demonstrate the wide range tunability of the graphene plasmons and can help to design structures with desired spectra, which can be used to enhance optical fields in the infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum.
The electron gas hosted in a two-dimensional solid-state matrix, such as a quantum well or a two-dimensional van der Waals heterostructure, supports the propagation of plasma waves. Nonlinear interactions between plasma waves, due to charge conservation and current convection, generate a constant density gradient which can be detected as a dc potential signal at the boundaries of the system. This phenomenon is at the heart of a plasma-wave photodetection scheme which was first introduced by Dyakonov and Shur for electronic systems with a parabolic dispersion and then extended to the massless Dirac fermions in graphene. In this work, we develop the theory of plasma-wave photodetection in bilayer graphene, which has the peculiarity that the dispersion relation depends locally and dynamically on the intensity of the plasma wave. In our analysis, we show how quantum capacitance effects, arising from the local fluctuations of the electronic dispersion, modify the intensity of the photodetection signal. An external electrical bias, e.g. induced by top and bottom gates, can be used to control the strength of the quantum capacitance corrections, and thus the photoresponse.
The dispersion relation of surface plasmon polaritons in graphene that includes optical losses is often obtained for complex wave vectors while the frequencies are assumed to be real. This approach, however, is not suitable for describing the temporal dynamics of optical excitations and the spectral properties of graphene. Here, we propose an alternative approach that calculates the dispersion relation in the complex frequency and real wave vector space. This approach provides a clearer insight into the optical properties of a graphene layer and allows us to find the surface plasmon modes of a graphene sheet in the full frequency range, thus removing the earlier reported limitation (1.667 < $hbaromega/mu$ < 2) for the transverse-electric mode. We further develop a simple analytic approximation which accurately describes the dispersion of the surface plasmon polariton modes in graphene. Using this approximation, we show that transverse-electric surface plasmon polaritons propagate along the graphene sheet without losses even at finite temperature.
Topological insulators (TIs) represent a novel quantum state of matter, characterized by edge or surface-states, showing up on the topological character of the bulk wave functions. Allowing electrons to move along their surface, but not through their inside, they emerged as an intriguing material platform for the exploration of exotic physical phenomena, somehow resembling the graphene Dirac-cone physics, as well as for exciting applications in optoelectronics, spintronics, nanoscience, low-power electronics, and quantum computing. Investigation of topological surface states (TSS) is conventionally hindered by the fact that in most of experimental conditions the TSS properties are mixed up with those of bulk-states. Here, we devise a novel tool to unveil TSS and to probe related plasmonic effects. By engineering Bi2Te(3-x)Sex stoichiometry, and by gating the surface of nanoscale field-effect-transistors, exploiting thin flakes of Bi2Te2.2Se0.8 or Bi2Se3, we provide the first demonstration of room-temperature Terahertz (THz) detection mediated by over-damped plasma-wave oscillations on the activated TSS of a Bi2Te2.2Se0.8 flake. The reported detection performances allow a realistic exploitation of TSS for large-area, fast imaging, promising superb impacts on THz photonics.