No Arabic abstract
Energy can be transferred in a radiative manner between objects with different electrical fluctuations. In this work, we consider near-field energy transfer between two separated parallel plates: one is graphene-covered boron nitride and the other a magneto-optic medium. We first study the energy transfer between the two plates having the same temperature. An electric current through the graphene gives rise to nonequilibrium fluctuations and induces the energy transfer. Both the magnitude and direction of the energy flux can be controlled by the electric current and an in-plane magnetic field in the magneto-optic medium. This is due to the interplay between nonreciprocal effective photonic temperature in graphene and nonreciprocal surface modes in the magneto-optic plate. Furthermore, we report that a tunable thermoelectric current can be generated in the graphene in the presence of a temperature difference between the two plates.
Spin and orbital angular momentum of light plays a central role in quantum nanophotonics as well as topological electrodynamics. Here, we show that the thermal radiation from finite-sized bodies comprising of nonreciprocal magneto-optical materials can exert a spin torque even in global thermal equilibrium. Moving beyond the paradigm of near-field heat transfer, we calculate near-field radiative angular momentum transfer between finite-sized nonreciprocal objects by combining Rytovs fluctuational electrodynamics with the theory of optical angular momentum. We prove that a single magneto-optical cubic particle in non-equilibrium with its surroundings experiences a torque in the presence of an applied magnetic field (T-symmetry breaking). Furthermore, even in global thermal equilibrium, two particles with misaligned gyrotropic axes experience equal magnitude torques with opposite signs which tend to align their gyrotropic axes parallel to each other. Our results are universally applicable to semiconductors like InSb (magneto-plasmas) as well as Weyl semi-metals which exhibit the anomalous Hall effect (gyrotropy) at infrared frequencies. Our work paves the way towards near-field angular momentum transfer mediated by thermal fluctuations for nanoscale devices.
We study the radiative heat transfer between multilayer structures made by a periodic repetition of a graphene sheet and a hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) slab. Surface plasmons in a monolayer graphene can couple with a hyperbolic phonon polaritons in a single hBN film to form hybrid polaritons that can assist photon tunneling. For periodic multilayer graphene/hBN structures, the stacked metallic/dielectric array can give rise to a further effective hyperbolic behavior, in addition to the intrinsic natural hyperbolic behavior of hBN. The effective hyperbolicity can enable more hyperbolic polaritons that enhance the photon tunneling and hence the near-field heat transfer. However, the hybrid polaritons on the surface, i.e. surface plasmon-phonon polaritons, dominate the near-field heat transfer between multilayer structures when the topmost layer is graphene. The effective hyperbolic regions can be well predicted by the effective medium theory (EMT), thought EMT fails to capture the hybrid surface polaritons and results in a heat transfer rate much lower compared to the exact calculation. The chemical potential of the graphene sheets can be tuned through electrical gating and results in an additional modulation of the heat transfer. We found that the near-field heat transfer between multilayer structure does not increase monotonously with the number of layer in the stack, which provides a way to control the heat transfer rate by the number of graphene layers in the multilayer structure. The results may benefit the applications of near-field energy harvesting and radiative cooling based on hybrid polaritons in two-dimensional materials.
In this work we describe different types of photonic structures that allow tunability of the photonic band gap upon the application of external stimuli, as the electric or magnetic field. We review and compare two porous 1D photonic crystals: in the first one a liquid crystal has been infiltrated in the pores of the nanoparticle network, while in the second one the optical response to the electric field of metallic nanoparticles has been exploited. Then, we present a 1D photonic crystal made with indium tin oxide (ITO) nanoparticles, and we propose this system for electro-optic tuning. Finally, we describe a microcavity with a defect mode that is tuned in the near infrared by the magnetic field, envisaging a contact-less magneto-optic switch. These optical switches can find applications in ICT and electrochromic windows.
Optical near-field interactions between nanostructured matter, such as quantum dots, result in unidirectional optical excitation transfer when energy dissipation is induced. This results in versatile spatiotemporal dynamics of the optical excitation, which can be controlled by engineering the dissipation processes and exploited to realize intelligent capabilities such as solution searching and decision making. Here we experimentally demonstrate the ability to solve a decision making problem on the basis of optical excitation transfer via near-field interactions by using colloidal quantum dots of different sizes, formed on a geometry-controlled substrate. We characterize the energy transfer behavior due to multiple control light patterns and experimentally demonstrate the ability to solve the multi-armed bandit problem. Our work makes a decisive step towards the practical design of nanophotonic systems capable of efficient decision making, one of the most important intellectual attributes of the human brain.
We theoretically and experimentally demonstrate energy transfer mediated by optical near-field interactions in a multi-layer InAs quantum dot (QD) structure composed of a single layer of larger dots and N layers of smaller ones. We construct a stochastic model in which optical near-field interactions that follow a Yukawa potential, QD size fluctuations, and temperature-dependent energy level broadening are unified, enabling us to examine device-architecture-dependent energy transfer efficiencies. The model results are consistent with the experiments. This study provides an insight into optical energy transfer involving inherent disorders in materials and paves the way to systematic design principles of nanophotonic devices that will allow optimized performance and the realization of designated functions.