Graphene-based plasmonic switches at near infrared frequencies

TL;DR

This paper presents the design and analysis of graphene-based plasmonic switches operating at near infrared frequencies, utilizing the field effect in graphene to control plasmon propagation for high transmission or isolation.

Contribution

It introduces a novel graphene-based plasmonic switch design and provides electromagnetic modeling using full-wave simulations and transmission line theory.

Findings

Switching performance depends on dielectric media and waveguide dimensions

Electrostatic gating effectively controls plasmon propagation

Full-wave simulations validate the switch design

Abstract

The concept, analysis, and design of series switches for graphene-strip plasmonic waveguides at near infrared frequencies are presented. Switching is achieved by using graphene's field effect to selectively enable or forbid propagation on a section of the graphene strip waveguide, thereby allowing good transmission or high isolation, respectively. The electromagnetic modeling of the proposed structure is performed using full-wave simulations and a transmission line model combined with a matrix-transfer approach, which takes into account the characteristics of the plasmons supported by the different graphene-strip waveguide sections of the device. The performance of the switch is evaluated versus different parameters of the structure, including surrounding dielectric media, electrostatic gating and waveguide dimensions.