Investigating Bright and Dark Plasmons With All k Vectors and All Energies

Aaron Lewis Applied Physics, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel Dmitry Lev Applied Physics, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel Rimma Dekhter Nanonics Imaging Ltd., Nanonics Imaging Ltd., Jerusalem, Israel Meirav Oded Institute of Chemistry, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel Patricia Hamra Nanonics Imaging Ltd., Nanonics Imaging Ltd., Jerusalem, Israel Hesham Taha Nanonics Imaging Ltd., Nanonics Imaging Ltd., Jerusalem, Israel Roy Shenhar Institute of Chemistry, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel

New apertured and apertureless methods will be described with relationship to the excitation and detection of dark and bright surface plasmon polaritons. The methods are based on interrogating appropriate samples with multiple probes. As has been very elegantly demonstrated by Xifeng Ren et al, [Applied Physics Letters 98, 201113 (2011)] an apertured NSOM probe acts as a point surface plasmon polariton source with a deterministic position and minimum requirement for the light source. On the other hand Dobman et al, [Adv. Optical Mater. 2014, DOI: 10.1002/adom.201400237 ] have shown that a second type of bound surface plasmon polariton, that cannot be excited from the far-field, propagates well across a metasurface. Such a bound plasmon polariton can be excited by similar apertured probes. All of these probes are constructed to allow for contact of one probe with another which is readily accomplished. Furthermore, as will be demonstrated in this paper such multiprobe techniques can be used to excite surface plasmon propagation with all k vectors and all energies with electron tunneling rather than the use of any light. The resulting plasmon propagation can be detected by both apertured and apertureless methods.

aaronl@savion.huji.ac.il