Compact magnetic antennas for directional excitation of surface plasmons

Plasmonics is considered as one of the most promising candidates for implementing the next generation of ultrafast and ultracompact photonic circuits. Considerable effort has been made to scale down individual plasmonic components into the nanometer regime. However, a compact plasmonic source that can efficiently generate surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) and deliver SPPs to the region of interest is yet to be realized. Here, bridging the optical antenna theory and the recently developed concept of metamaterials, we demonstrate a subwavelength, highly efficient plasmonic source for directional generation of SPPs. The designed device consists of two nanomagnetic resonators with detuned resonant frequencies. At the operating wavelength, incident photons can be efficiently channeled into SPP waves modulated by the electric field polarization. By tailoring the relative phase at resonance and the separation between the two nanoresonators, SPPs can be steered to predominantly propagate along one specific direction. This novel magnetic nanoantenna paves a new way to manipulate photons in the near-field, and also could be useful for SPP-based nonlinear applications, active modulations, and wireless optical communications.