"Graphene nanophotonics: Smaller, stronger, faster"
Lead Research Organisation:
UNIVERSITY OF EXETER
Department Name: Physics
Abstract
Understanding and controlling the interaction between light and matter is fundamental to science and technology - from probing entanglement in quantum physics to optical networks for information technology. Using traditional optics, light can only be controlled on length scales down to the wavelength of light, the classical diffraction limit. This limit has huge consequences, setting stringent boundaries for a host of phenomena. In recent years plasmonics has emerged as a means to beat this apparent limit. The key attribute of plasmon resonances, typically observed in nanoparticles of gold and silver, is the ability to concentrate optical energy into volumes well below the diffraction limit. This light focussing property gives rise to many potential applications, from photo thermal treatment of cancer to light harvesting in enhanced solar cells.
However, the field of plasmonics currently stands at a cross-road. The enormous potential of plasmonics as a means to manipulate light at the nanoscale is blocked by ohmic losses associated with the metals used; these losses ultimately set limits on light focussing and energy concentration. In this project I will explore a radical alternative by replacing conventional metals with new atomic scale, graphene-like layered materials. The ultimate goal is to overcome the critical limitations which currently hold plasmonics back, and thereby define future directions in the field. The three broad aims are:
(1) Smaller - I will study the fundamental limits of energy concentration in plasmonics. Efforts will concentrate on developing and optimising platforms in promising new plasmonic materials based on the atomically layered structure of graphene.
(2) Stronger - Energy concentration comes at a heavy price due to high absorption losses, which normally limits the plasmon lifetime to a few short femtoseconds. Recent results suggest absorption losses can be overcome by utilizing amplifying gain materials, which will enable active functionalities in these new plasmonic materials.
(3) Faster - Atomic scale materials will bypass the problems associated with absorption, and will transform our ability to manipulate light on ultrafast timescales. This has enormous consequences, with potential applications for switching and nonlinearity, both vital for information processing with light.
An ambitious plan is laid out, through which the vision of manipulating light on extreme sub-wavelength length scales will be made possible. This grand-scale project will unlock the true potential of ultrathin plasmonic materials for real-world photonic and optoelectronic devices.
However, the field of plasmonics currently stands at a cross-road. The enormous potential of plasmonics as a means to manipulate light at the nanoscale is blocked by ohmic losses associated with the metals used; these losses ultimately set limits on light focussing and energy concentration. In this project I will explore a radical alternative by replacing conventional metals with new atomic scale, graphene-like layered materials. The ultimate goal is to overcome the critical limitations which currently hold plasmonics back, and thereby define future directions in the field. The three broad aims are:
(1) Smaller - I will study the fundamental limits of energy concentration in plasmonics. Efforts will concentrate on developing and optimising platforms in promising new plasmonic materials based on the atomically layered structure of graphene.
(2) Stronger - Energy concentration comes at a heavy price due to high absorption losses, which normally limits the plasmon lifetime to a few short femtoseconds. Recent results suggest absorption losses can be overcome by utilizing amplifying gain materials, which will enable active functionalities in these new plasmonic materials.
(3) Faster - Atomic scale materials will bypass the problems associated with absorption, and will transform our ability to manipulate light on ultrafast timescales. This has enormous consequences, with potential applications for switching and nonlinearity, both vital for information processing with light.
An ambitious plan is laid out, through which the vision of manipulating light on extreme sub-wavelength length scales will be made possible. This grand-scale project will unlock the true potential of ultrathin plasmonic materials for real-world photonic and optoelectronic devices.
Planned Impact
Developments in recent months have pointed towards nano-structured graphene as a ground-breaking new material in the field of nano plasmonics. This new material will allow us to push the boundaries in the fields of nanophotonics and plasmonics by controlling and even eliminating material losses. This research project will construct a foundation for using graphene as the backbone of optical and optoelectronic devices, with applications as diverse as light harvesting, photodetectors and optical sensing. Knowledge gained will be therefore be of intrinsic interest to the UK's electromagnetics and metamaterials research community, including those involved with the study of transformation optics and negative refraction. Our results will also feed into antenna and communication, imaging, anti-counterfeiting and homeland security applications.
In the later work packages, this project aims to demonstrate and develop several new tools and/or techniques for fundamental and applied research. Potential technologies under consideration in the final work package represent a radically new approach to well established, plasmon based sensing and analysis techniques. Once understood, the development of new sensing and spectroscopy techniques based on our discoveries could provide effective measurement tools for molecular materials, aimed primarily at the realms of biophotonics and life sciences. Some preliminary estimates based on estimates of modal volumes from the literature suggest that these tools could allow the ultrasensitive detection of biomaterial at the pictogram level, which may give rise to new types of measurement which were previously considered impossible. For example, one can envisage experiments to monitor protein dynamics in ultra-small (nanofluidic) volumes or the rapid assaying of molecular structure. In order to exploit this, I will fully engage with industry-facing platforms including the Technology Strategy Board's Electronics, Sensors, Photonics (ESP) Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN), and the MOD's Defence Materials Centre (of which Exeter is an active member). Through these organisations, I will commit to disseminate our findings to new networks, ensuring the sensing community is able to make the best use of our newfound knowledge in this sector, and to find fresh contacts and routes for partnerships. An important strand will be ensuring impact in the intellectual user community. I have significant experience in managing industrial relations, notably through industrial CASE awards jointly with QinetiQ (indeed, QinetiQ also have major involvement through Exeter's Knowledge Transfer Account "Tailored Electromagnetic Solutions" with the EPSRC). They will provide a technical point of contact for us to engage and interact with a view to exploiting our results.
The PDRAs and PhD students working with us will benefit through this highly multidiscipliunary project, both in terms of specific research skills and also in terms of work/project management. They will be expected to take an active role in collaborating with external colleagues. They will also be involved with knowledge transfer, intellectual property and commercial relations: training on all of these topics will be available through Exeter's RKT office. They will play a key role in giving presentations, ranging from regular intradepartmental meetings to commercial briefings and scientific workshops/conferences, and in writing publications/reports. These young researchers will therefore develop a unique and highly marketable skill set, with transferable skills generated at the interface between the physical sciences and engineering.
In the later work packages, this project aims to demonstrate and develop several new tools and/or techniques for fundamental and applied research. Potential technologies under consideration in the final work package represent a radically new approach to well established, plasmon based sensing and analysis techniques. Once understood, the development of new sensing and spectroscopy techniques based on our discoveries could provide effective measurement tools for molecular materials, aimed primarily at the realms of biophotonics and life sciences. Some preliminary estimates based on estimates of modal volumes from the literature suggest that these tools could allow the ultrasensitive detection of biomaterial at the pictogram level, which may give rise to new types of measurement which were previously considered impossible. For example, one can envisage experiments to monitor protein dynamics in ultra-small (nanofluidic) volumes or the rapid assaying of molecular structure. In order to exploit this, I will fully engage with industry-facing platforms including the Technology Strategy Board's Electronics, Sensors, Photonics (ESP) Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN), and the MOD's Defence Materials Centre (of which Exeter is an active member). Through these organisations, I will commit to disseminate our findings to new networks, ensuring the sensing community is able to make the best use of our newfound knowledge in this sector, and to find fresh contacts and routes for partnerships. An important strand will be ensuring impact in the intellectual user community. I have significant experience in managing industrial relations, notably through industrial CASE awards jointly with QinetiQ (indeed, QinetiQ also have major involvement through Exeter's Knowledge Transfer Account "Tailored Electromagnetic Solutions" with the EPSRC). They will provide a technical point of contact for us to engage and interact with a view to exploiting our results.
The PDRAs and PhD students working with us will benefit through this highly multidiscipliunary project, both in terms of specific research skills and also in terms of work/project management. They will be expected to take an active role in collaborating with external colleagues. They will also be involved with knowledge transfer, intellectual property and commercial relations: training on all of these topics will be available through Exeter's RKT office. They will play a key role in giving presentations, ranging from regular intradepartmental meetings to commercial briefings and scientific workshops/conferences, and in writing publications/reports. These young researchers will therefore develop a unique and highly marketable skill set, with transferable skills generated at the interface between the physical sciences and engineering.
People |
ORCID iD |
Euan Hendry (Principal Investigator / Fellow) |
Publications
Barr L
(2018)
Investigating the nature of chiral near-field interactions
in Physical Review B
Barr LE
(2016)
On the origin of pure optical rotation in twisted-cross metamaterials.
in Scientific reports
Beckerleg C
(2018)
Cavity enhanced third harmonic generation in graphene
in Applied Physics Letters
Beckerleg C
(2016)
Localized plasmons induced by spatial conductivity modulation in graphene
in Journal of the Optical Society of America B
Bohn J
(2021)
All-optical switching of an epsilon-near-zero plasmon resonance in indium tin oxide.
in Nature communications
Bohn J
(2021)
Author Correction: All-optical switching of an epsilon-near-zero plasmon resonance in indium tin oxide.
in Nature communications
Bonn M
(2017)
Role of Dielectric Drag in Polaron Mobility in Lead Halide Perovskites
in ACS Energy Letters
Constant T
(2017)
Intensity dependences of the nonlinear optical excitation of plasmons in graphene
in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences
Constant T
(2015)
All-optical generation of surface plasmons in graphene
in Nature Physics
Herapath R
(2019)
Impact of pump wavelength on terahertz emission of a cavity-enhanced spintronic trilayer
in Applied Physics Letters
Hornett S
(2014)
Optically induced oxygen desorption from graphene measured using femtosecond two-pulse correlation
in Physical Review B
Hornett SM
(2016)
Subwavelength Terahertz Imaging of Graphene Photoconductivity.
in Nano letters
Karlsen P
(2018)
Sign inversion in the terahertz photoconductivity of single-walled carbon nanotube films
in Physical Review B
Karlsen P
(2018)
Influence of nanotube length and density on the plasmonic terahertz response of single-walled carbon nanotubes
in Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics
Mikhaylovskiy R
(2014)
Erratum: Ultrafast inverse Faraday effect in a paramagnetic terbium gallium garnet crystal [Phys. Rev. B 86 , 100405(R) (2012)]
in Physical Review B
Mikhaylovskiy R
(2014)
Terahertz emission spectroscopy of laser-induced spin dynamics in TmFeO 3 and ErFeO 3 orthoferrites
in Physical Review B
Mikhaylovskiy RV
(2015)
Ultrafast optical modification of exchange interactions in iron oxides.
in Nature communications
Polyushkin D
(2015)
Controlling the generation of THz radiation from metallic films using periodic microstructure
in Applied Physics B
Polyushkin D
(2014)
Mechanisms of THz generation from silver nanoparticle and nanohole arrays illuminated by 100 fs pulses of infrared light
in Physical Review B
Semaltianos N
(2015)
Electrophoretic deposition on graphene of Au nanoparticles generated by laser ablation of a bulk Au target in water
in Laser Physics Letters
Semaltianos N
(2014)
Laser ablation of a bulk Cr target in liquids for nanoparticle synthesis
in RSC Adv.
Stantchev R
(2015)
Enhanced THz transmission and imaging of a subwavelength slit via light-induced diffraction
in Physical Review A
Stantchev R
(2018)
Subwavelength hyperspectral THz studies of articular cartilage
in Scientific Reports
Stantchev R
(2017)
Compressed sensing with near-field THz radiation
in Optica
Stantchev RI
(2016)
Noninvasive, near-field terahertz imaging of hidden objects using a single-pixel detector.
in Science advances
Tollerton CJ
(2019)
Origins of All-Optical Generation of Plasmons in Graphene.
in Scientific reports
Tomadin A
(2018)
The ultrafast dynamics and conductivity of photoexcited graphene at different Fermi energies.
in Science advances
Ulbricht R
(2017)
Erratum: Carrier dynamics in semiconductors studied with time-resolved terahertz spectroscopy [Rev. Mod. Phys. 83 , 543 (2011)]
in Reviews of Modern Physics
Description | EXTREMAG: an Exeter-based Time Resolved Magnetism Facility |
Amount | £1,128,435 (GBP) |
Funding ID | EP/R008809/1 |
Organisation | Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 01/2018 |
End | 12/2021 |
Description | FP7 FET grant |
Amount | € 395,000 (EUR) |
Organisation | European Research Council (ERC) |
Sector | Public |
Country | Belgium |
Start | 01/2014 |
End | 01/2017 |
Description | TEAM-A: The tailored electromagnetic and acoustic materials accelerator |
Amount | £2,433,195 (GBP) |
Funding ID | EP/R004781/1 |
Organisation | Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 09/2017 |
End | 09/2023 |
Description | ICFO |
Organisation | ICFO - The Institute of Photonic Sciences |
Country | Spain |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | This partnership forms the basis of a FET european grant between groups at ICFO, Exeter, Berlin and Vienna, aimed at investigating the possibilities for single photon nonlinearities in graphene. |
Collaborator Contribution | Theory development and sample fabrication. |
Impact | Multidisciplinary: Theory - development of nonlinear optical models for graphene Sample Fab - fabrication of nanopatterned graphene devices |
Start Year | 2014 |
Description | QinetiQ |
Organisation | Qinetiq |
Department | QinetiQ (Farnborough) |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Development of subwavelength THz imaging |
Collaborator Contribution | Materials and optics knowledge. |
Impact | New THz imaging technique developed in Exeter |
Start Year | 2012 |