Excitation of surface plasmon polaritons guided mode by Rhodamine B molecules doped in PMMA stripe

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates how Rhodamine B molecules embedded in a dielectric-loaded surface plasmon waveguide can be used to precisely characterize the waveguide's optical properties through fluorescence coupling and leakage radiation microscopy.

Contribution

It introduces a novel method for optical characterization of plasmonic waveguides using dye molecules and leakage radiation microscopy.

Findings

Measured propagation constant of the mode

Determined attenuation length of the plasmonic mode

Validated the coupling of dye fluorescence to guided modes

Abstract

In this letter we show the inclusion of Rhodamine B molecules (RhB) inside a dielectric-loaded surface plasmon waveguide enables for a precise determination of its optical characteristics. The principle relies on the coupling of the fluorescence emission of the dye to plasmonic waveguided modes allowed in of the structure. Using leakage radiation microscopy in real and reciprocal spaces, we measure the propagation constant of the mode and as well as their attenuation length.