Modulational instability of a recent nonlinear plasmonic metamaterial: Finite-difference-time-domain simulations

TL;DR

This paper uses finite-difference-time-domain simulations to evaluate the stability of negative-to-positive index switching in nonlinear plasmonic metamaterials, revealing potential fragility in the proposed switching mechanism.

Contribution

It provides a realistic simulation-based verification of the stability of optical index switching in a specific nonlinear plasmonic metamaterial.

Findings

Negative-to-positive index switching may be fragile.

Uniform switching of local optical constants is not always reliable.

Simulation results challenge previous theoretical proposals.

Abstract

By doing time-domain simulations, we find the proposal for negative-to-positive index switching proposed in [Physical Review Letters, 106 105503 (2012)] may be fragile. The negative opinion on the uniform switching of local optical constants in our recent paper [arXiv:1111.1476v2] based on the circuit model of metamaterials can therefore be verified in this specific and realistic case.