Related Experiment Video
Updated: Feb 14, 2026

Determination of the Excitation and Coupling Rates Between Light Emitters and Surface Plasmon Polaritons
Published on: July 21, 2018
Tuning the dispersion of effective surface plasmon polaritons with multilayer systems
Abstract:
Recently, effective surface plasmon polaritons (ESPPs) induced by structural dispersion in bounded waveguides were theoretically demonstrated and experimentally verified. Despite the theoretical and experimental efforts, whether ESPPs can mimic real SPPs in every aspect still remains an open question. In this work, we go one step further to study the hybridization of ESPPs in multilayer systems. We consider transverse electric (TE) modes in a conventional rectangular waveguide and a parallel-plate waveguide (PPW) and derive analytically the dispersion relations and asymptotic frequencies of the corresponding ESPPs modes in sandwiched structures consisting of alternating dielectrics of different permittivities. Our results show that the ESPPs can be categorized into odd and even parities (owing to the 'plasmon' hybridization) in a similar way as natural SPPs supported by the insulator/metal/insulator (IMI) and metal/insulator/metal (MIM) heterostructures in the optical regime. The similarities and differences between ESSPs and their optical counterparts are also discussed in details, which may provide valuable guidance for future application of ESPPs at the microwave and terahertz frequencies.
Related Concept Videos
Distribution and Dispersion
Factors Affecting Dissolution: Particle Size and Effective Surface Area
Problem-Solving: Tuning of a Guitar String
The string's wave speed can be regulated by varying the linear density. Tension is the other property that determines the speed of...
Second Order systems II
First Order Systems
When a first-order system is subjected to a unit-step input, its response is characterized by its transfer function. By applying the Laplace transform of the unit-step input to the transfer function, expanding the...
Second Order systems I
By reinterpreting the system, one can derive the closed-loop transfer function, which...

