Metal-dielectric-metal plasmonic waveguide devices for manipulating light at the nanoscale, Chinese Optics Letters 7

We review some of the recent advances in the development of subwavelength plasmonic devices for ma-nipulating light at the nanoscale, drawing examples from our own work in metal-dielectric-metal (MDM) plasmonic waveguide devices. We introduce bends, splitters, and mode converters for MDM waveguides with no additional loss. We also demonstrate that optical gain provides a mechanism for on/off switch-ing in MDM plasmonic waveguides. Highly efficient compact couplers between dielectric waveguides and MDM waveguides are also introduced. OCIS codes: 130.2790, 240.6680, 260.2110. doi: 10.3788/COL20090704.0302