ERI: Thermal Assisted Plasmon-Plasmon interaction for active control of Electron Density Waves at Metal Semiconductor Interfaces - A Roadmap to Novel All-Optical Devices

当今的信息时代要求能够在较短的时间内传输和处理海量数据。在医疗保健、网络安全、银行、通信、国防和太空探索等应用中，超高速数据传输是通过对光子上的数据进行编码来实现的。然而，对更快的数据处理的需求推动了微处理器技术的创新和进步，朝着更小、超快和低功耗的电子产品发展。尽管在开发高效电子设备方面不断取得进展，但在过去几年中，微处理器的时钟速度已经达到了约5 GHz的饱和。这可以归因于与电子互连和散热相关的损耗。全光模拟器正日益成为一种有吸引力的替代方案，以克服与电子学相关的限制。然而，光子处理器件的实现需要有效的机制来实现微米和纳米尺度的光子与光子的相互作用。在这里，我们提出了一种新的数据处理元件--全光开关，它有可能用作具有高数据速率的电子设备的光学模拟，同时使设备的尺寸比传统的光子元件小得多。这项工作的重大影响将是为阿拉巴马州黑带地区的本科生，包括代表性不足的群体、残疾退伍军人和低收入人群开辟参与半导体光子学和计算光学领域的前沿研究活动的途径，实施新的教学方法，并通过让高中生和当地社区参与有趣的光学主题来寻求更广泛的扩展。这项提议旨在开发一种新的全光等离子开关，热辅助全等离子体开关的工作原理是利用等离子体结构(或粒子)上激发的局域表面等离子体模，对金属掺杂半导体界面上传播的表面等离子体模进行热光-电控制。此外，分析和计算方法之间的协同作用将被用来揭示极端的轻物质相互作用，促进局域表面等离子体共振和表面等离子体激元相互作用的动力学和热机制，以及金属-半导体界面的极不均匀和快速变化的局部介电环境。所获得的理解将用于设计和测试高性能光子元件的数值原型，如全光开关，这些元件可能在纳米和微观长度尺度上提供高数据速率。结合理论，数值测量将确定控制器件3db带宽的限制和定标规律，确定热电光信号调制率的器件体系结构，使信号调制超过-10db的时间尺度降至皮秒尺度，并确定与当今的全光元件相比小得多的模式尺寸。值得注意的是，拟议的研究提出了一种新的方法，开辟了快速和高效的光学设备、电路、逻辑元件和其他可能导致与集成光学和全光电子相关的创新技术的新途径，这是一个价值数十亿美元的行业。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The present ‘information age’ demands for the capability to transfer and process huge amount of data relatively in short span of time. In applications from health care, cyber security, banking, communications, defense and space exploration, ultra-fast data transfer is accomplished by encoding the data on photons. Whereas the need for faster data processing in fueled the innovations and advancements in microprocessor technology with progression towards smaller, ultrafast, and low-power electronics. Despite continuous progression aiming at developing efficient electronic devices; saturation in the microprocessor clock speed at about 5GHz has been observed over the past few years. This can be attributed to the losses associated with electronic interconnects and heat dissipation. All-optical analogues are increasingly becoming an attractive alternative to overcome the limitations associated with electronics. However, implementation of photonic processing device needs efficient mechanism to achieve photon-to-photon interactions at micro and nanoscale scale sizes. Here we propose a new data processing element, an all-optical switch, with potential to serve as an optical analogue of electronic devices with high data rates, while concurrently enabling device sizes that are considerably smaller than traditional photonic elements. A significant impact of this work will be to open avenues for the undergraduate students, including underrepresented groups, disabled veterans and low-income populous in the Alabama black belt region to participate in the cutting-edge research activities in the field of semiconductor photonics and computational optics, implementing a new teaching methodology and pursuing a broader outreach by engaging high school children and local community with fascinating topics in optics.This proposal seeks to develop a new all-optical plasmonic switch, referred to as Thermal Assisted All Plasmonic Switch with operation based on thermo-opto-electronic control of propagating surface plasmon modes at metal-doped semiconductor interfaces by the localized surface plasmon modes excited at the plasmonic structures (or particles). Furthermore, a synergy between the analytical and computational approaches will be pursued to uncover the extreme light matter interactions, kinetic and thermal mechanisms facilitating the localized surface plasmon resonances and surface plasmon polaritons interactions with largely inhomogeneous and rapidly changing local dielectric environments of the Metal-Semiconductor interfaces. The gained understanding will be applied to design and test numerical prototypes of high-performance photonic elements such as all-optical switches, that can potentially provide high data rates at the nanoscopic and microscopic length scales. Numerical measurements, in conjunction with the theory, will establish the limitations and scaling laws governing the device 3dB bandwidth, determine device architectures for thermo-electro-optical signal modulation rates down to the picosecond time scale for signal modulation surpassing -10dB and mode sizes that are substantially smaller compared to present-day all-optical elements. Notably, the proposed research presents a new approach and creates new pathway toward fast and efficient optical devices, circuitry, logic elements and additional may lead to innovative technologies related to integrated optics and all-optical electronics, a multibillion-dollar industry.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.