Observing and Controlling a Tamm Plasmon at the Interface with a Metasurface

TL;DR

This paper experimentally demonstrates Tamm plasmons at the interface with a metasurface in the near-IR, showing their sensitivity to external perturbations and enabling spectral tuning via liquid crystal deposition and electrical switching.

Contribution

It introduces the first experimental observation of Tamm plasmons supported by a dielectric mirror with a metasurface and demonstrates their tunability through external stimuli.

Findings

Tamm plasmons can be supported by a dielectric mirror with a metasurface.

Depositing liquid crystal shifts the Tamm plasmon resonance by 35 nm.

Electrical switching of liquid crystal tunes the resonance within 10 nm.

Abstract

We demonstrate experimentally that Tamm plasmons in the near-IR can be supported by a dielectric mirror interfaced with a metasurface, a discontinuous thin metal film periodically patterned on the sub-wavelength scale. More crucially, not only do Tamm plasmons survive the nano-patterning of the metal film, but they also become sensitive to external perturbations, as a result. In particular, by depositing a nematic liquid crystal on the outer side of the metasurface we were able to red-shift the spectral position of Tamm plasmon by 35 nm, while electrical switching of the liquid crystal enabled us to tune the wavelength of this notoriously inert excitation within a 10 nm range.