Coupling mediated coherent control of localized plasmonic resonances

直接控制光与物质的相互作用，从而改变光的传播是光学研究中的一个主要挑战。在我们的项目中，我们希望探索等离子体超材料中相干控制光-物质相互作用的可能性，目的是改变光的传播和非线性光发射。在比较以前和正在进行的研究领域的相干控制的光场，我们的建议侧重于强近场相互作用的等离子体元原子。特别是，我们感兴趣的是利用强近场耦合效应相干控制等离子体激元诱导透明的效果。类似于原子物理，其中电磁感应透明可以导致由于大色散而增强的非线性特性，我们期望等离子体元原子中的等离子体感应透明应该导致类似的效应，如光存储和强场增强。然而，等离子体激元系统中的短寿命和高能量耗散以及极小的结构尺寸在实际实现中是巨大的挑战。此外，目前还不清楚近场耦合效应是否足够强，以导致光学性质的完全控制。满足这些挑战将产生一个基本的和更完整的理解的线性和非线性光学性质的集体激发在强耦合金属元原子和超材料。这些问题的解决将有助于改善或改善金属基纳米结构有源光子器件的非线性响应。

A direct control of the light matter interaction and therefore the modification of the light propagation is a major challenge in optical research. With our project we want to explore the possibilities of coherently controlled light-matter interaction in plasmonic metamaterials with the goal of modifying the light propagation and nonlinear light emission. In comparison to previous and on-going research in the field of coherent control of light fields our proposal focuses on the strong near-field interaction of plasmonic meta-atoms. In particular we are interested in utilizing strong near-field coupling effects to coherently control an effect called plasmon induced transparency. Similar to atomic physics where the electromagnetic induced transparency can lead to an enhancement of the nonlinear properties due to large dispersion we expect that the plasmon induced transparency in plasmonic meta-atoms should lead to similar effects like light storage and strong field enhancement. However, the short life times and the high energy dissipation in the plasmonic systems together with extremely small structures sizes are tremendous challenges in a practical realization. Furthermore, it is unclear if the near-field coupling effects are strong enough to lead to a complete control of the optical properties. Meeting these challenges will yield a fundamental and more complete understanding of the linear and nonlinear optical properties of collective excitations in strongly coupled metallic meta-atoms and metamaterials. The answers of these problems can potentially help to modify or improve the nonlinear response of active photonic devices with metal-based nanostructures in the future.