Optical absorbing origin of chiroptical activity in planar plasmonic metasurfaces

As a significant characteristic of many biomolecules, chemical substances, and artificial nanostructures, chirality conduce different types of optical interactions with the spin angular momentum of the impinging light field. Although, chiral arrangement and spatial phase retardation are the key factors for obtaining chirality in three-dimensional (3D) structures, the origin of chirality in the feasible planar structures has not been thoroughly addressed. Here using an intuitive and simple analytical approach, called cross-hybridization model, the essence and properties of the optical chirality of individual planar nanostructures are unveiled. In order to fundamentally address this chirality in terms of circular dichroism (CD), the chiroptical response of a simple dimer composed of the lossy nanoblocks in L-shape arrangement are investigated based on the provided optical interaction and loss effects. The theoretical findings, adequately supported by the numerical calculations, reveal that chiroptical activity occurs predominantly due to handedness-dependent absorption or heating loss in a nanostructured metasurface.