Plasmon resonances of a prolate spheroid nanoparticle illuminated by a focused beam

The interaction of a radially focused beam with a prolate spheroidal nanoparticle is particularly important because it has the potential to produce strong nearfield electromagnetic radiation. Strong and tightly localized longitudinal components of a radially polarized focused beam can excite strong plasmon modes on elongated nanoparticles such as prolate spheroids. In this study, near field radiation from a prolate spheriodal nanoparticle is investigated when it is illuminated with a radially polarized focused beam of light. Nearfield radiation from the nanoparticle is investigated in the absence and presence of metallic layers

Patterned medium for heat assisted magnetic recording

Heat assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) a potential solution to extend the limits of conventional magnetic recording. In HAMR, the heating of the recording medium is achieved with a near-field optical transducer. Although the literature suggests novel transducers, there is little consideration of the optical and thermal aspects of the magnetic medium. In this letter we suggest a recording medium that provides a significant enhancement in optical absorption and localized heating. The thermal profiles of the proposed medium and the conventional medium are compared using finite element method solutions of Maxwell’s and the heat transfer equations

Birefringent and dichroic behaviour of plasmonic nano-antennas

Birefringence and dichroism of plasmonic nano-antennas are investigated. We demonstrate that birefringent and dichroic behaviour of a cross-dipole nanoantenna is due to a length difference, and a relative plasmonic enhancement of the antenna particles, respectively

Interaction of radially polarized focused light with a prolate spheroidal nanoparticle

The interaction of a nanoparticle with light is affected by nanoparticle geometry and composition, as well as by focused beam parameters, such as the polarization and numerical aperture of the beam. The interaction of a radially focused beam with a prolate spheroidal nanoparticle is particularly important because it has the potential to produce strong near-field electromagnetic radiation. Strong and tightly localized longitudinal components of a radially polarized focused beam can excite strong plasmon modes on elongated nanoparticles such as prolate spheroids. In this study, near field radiation from a prolate spheriodal nanoparticle is investigated when it is illuminated with a radially polarized focused beam of light. Near-field radiation from the nanoparticle is investigated in the absence and presence of metallic layers. It is shown that the interaction of a radially polarized focused beam with a prolate spheroidal nanoparticle can be enhanced by creating images of monopole charges using metallic layers. In addition, it is also observed that the presence of a metallic layer shifts the resonance of the prolate spheroid toward longer wavelengths. Dipole, quadruple, and off resonance field distributions for particles with different sizes and aspect ratios are presented when they are illuminated with a radially focused beam of light

An integral equation based numerical solution for nanoparticles illuminated with collimated and focused light

To address the large number of parameters involved in nanooptical problems, a more efficient computational method is necessary. An integral equation based numerical solution is developed when the particles are illuminated with collimated and focused incident beams. The solution procedure uses the method of weighted residuals, in which the integral equation is reduced to a matrix equation and then solved for the unknown electric field distribution. In the solution procedure, the effects of the surrounding medium and boundaries are taken into account using a Green’s function formulation. Therefore, there is no additional error due to artificial boundary conditions unlike differential equation based techniques, such as finite difference time domain and finite element method. In this formulation, only the scattering nano-particle is discretized. Such an approach results in a lesser number of unknowns in the resulting matrix equation. The results are compared to the analytical Mie series solution for spherical particles, as well as to the finite element method for rectangular metallic particles. The Richards-Wolf vector field equations are combined with the integral equation based formulation to model the interaction of nanoparticles with linearly and radially polarized incident focused beams

Circularly polarized localized near-field radiation at the nanoscale

A novel nano-antenna configuration is suggested to achieve circularly polarized optical spots beyond the diffraction limit. Intense optical spots with circular polarization are obtained using a cross-dipole nano-antenna

Localized radiative energy transfer from a plasmonic bow-tie nanoantenna to a magnetic thin film stack

Localized radiative energy transfer from a near-field emitter to a magnetic thin film structure is investigated. A magnetic thin film stack is placed in the near-field of the plasmonic nanoantenna to utilize the evanescent mode coupling between the nanoantenna and magnetic thin film stack. A bow-tie nano-optical antenna is excited with a tightly focused beam of light to improve near-field radiative energy transfer from the antenna to the magnetic thin film structure. A tightly focused incident optical beam with a wide angular spectrum is formulated using Richards-Wolf vector field equations. Radiative energy transfer is investigated using a frequency domain 3-D finite element method solution of Maxwell’s equations. Localized radiative energy transfer between the near-field emitter and the magnetic thin film structure is quantified for a given optical laser power at various distances between the near-field emitter and magnetic thin film

Surface roughness effects on the broadband reflection for refractory metals and polar dielectrics

Random surface roughness and surface distortions occur inevitably because of various material processing and fabrication techniques. Tailoring and smoothing the surface roughness can be especially challenging for thermomechanically stable materials, including refractory metals, such as tungsten (W), and polar dielectrics, such as silicon carbide (SiC). The spectral reflectivity and emissivity of surfaces are significantly impacted by surface roughness effects. In this paper, we numerically investigated the surface roughness effects on the spectral reflectivity and emissivity of thermomechanically stable materials. Based on our results, we determined that surface roughness effects are strongly impacted by the correlation length of the Gaussian surface. In addition, our results indicate that surface roughness effects are stronger for the materials at the epsilon-near-zero region. Surface roughness effects are stronger between the visible and infrared spectral region for W and around the wavelength of 12 mu m for SiC, where plasma frequency and polar resonance frequency are located