arXiv subjects

Francisco J. Garcia-Vidal

Publications and source records attributed to Francisco J. Garcia-Vidal.

27 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2015

Ultra-Efficient Coupling of a Quantum Emitter to the Tunable Guided Plasmons of a Carbon Nanotube

We show that a single quantum emitter can efficiently couple to the tunable plasmons of a highly doped single-wall carbon nanotube (SWCNT). Plasmons in these quasi-one-dimensional carbon structures exhibit deep subwavelength confinement that pushes the coupling efficiency close to 100% over a very broad spectral range. This phenomenon takes place for distances and tube diameters comprising the nanometer and micrometer scales. In particular, we find a beta factor ~1 for QEs placed 1-100 nm away from SWCNTs that are just a few nanometers in diameter, while the corresponding Purcell factor exceeds 10^6. Our finding not only holds great potential for waveguide QED, in which an efficient interaction between emitters and cavity modes is pivotal, but it also provides a way of realizing quantum strong coupling between several emitters mediated by SWCNT plasmons, which can be controlled through the large electro-optical tunability of these excitations.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2015

Magnetic-field control of near-field radiative heat transfer and the realization of highly tunable hyperbolic thermal emitters

We present a comprehensive theoretical study of the magnetic field dependence of the near-field radiative heat transfer (NFRHT) between two parallel plates. We show that when the plates are made of doped semiconductors, the near-field thermal radiation can be severely affected by the application of a static magnetic field. We find that irrespective of its direction, the presence of a magnetic field reduces the radiative heat conductance, and dramatic reductions up to 700% can be found with fields of about 6 T at room temperature. We show that this striking behavior is due to the fact that the magnetic field radically changes the nature of the NFRHT. The field not only affects the electromagnetic surface waves (both plasmons and phonon polaritons) that normally dominate the near-field radiation in doped semiconductors, but it also induces hyperbolic modes that progressively dominate the heat transfer as the field increases. In particular, we show that when the field is perpendicular to the plates, the semiconductors become ideal hyperbolic near-field emitters. More importantly, by changing the magnetic field, the system can be continuously tuned from a situation where the surface waves dominate the heat transfer to a situation where hyperbolic modes completely govern the near-field thermal radiation. We show that this high tunability can be achieved with accessible magnetic fields and very common materials like n-doped InSb or Si. Our study paves the way for an active control of NFRHT and it opens the possibility to study unique hyperbolic thermal emitters without the need to resort to complicated metamaterials.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2015

Cavity-induced modifications of molecular structure in the strong coupling regime

In most theoretical descriptions of collective strong coupling of organic molecules to a cavity mode, the molecules are modeled as simple two-level systems. This picture fails to describe the rich structure provided by their internal rovibrational (nuclear) degrees of freedom. We investigate a first-principles model that fully takes into account both electronic and nuclear degrees of freedom, allowing an exploration of the phenomenon of strong coupling from an entirely new perspective. First, we demonstrate the limitations of applicability of the Born-Oppenheimer approximation in strongly coupled molecule-cavity structures. For the case of two molecules, we also show how dark states, which within the two-level picture are effectively decoupled from the cavity, are indeed affected by the formation of collective strong coupling. Finally, we discuss ground-state modifications in the ultra-strong coupling regime and show that some molecular observables are affected by the collective coupling strength, while others only depend on the single-molecule coupling constant.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2015

Harvesting Excitons Through Plasmonic Strong Coupling

Exciton harvesting is demonstrated in an ensemble of quantum emitters coupled to localized surface plasmons. When the interaction between emitters and the dipole mode of a metallic nanosphere reaches the strong coupling regime, the exciton conductance is greatly increased. The spatial map of the conductance matches the plasmon field intensity profile, which indicates that transport properties can be tuned by adequately tailoring the field of the plasmonic resonance. Under strong coupling, we find that pure dephasing can have detrimental or beneficial effects on the conductance, depending on the effective number of participating emitters. Finally, we show that the exciton transport in the strong coupling regime occurs on an ultrafast timescale given by the inverse Rabi splitting ($\sim10~$fs), orders of magnitude faster than transport through direct hopping between the emitters.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2015

Quantum theory of collective strong coupling of molecular vibrations with a microcavity mode

We develop a quantum mechanical formalism to treat the strong coupling between an electromagnetic mode and a vibrational excitation of an ensemble of organic molecules. By employing a Bloch-Redfield-Wangsness approach, we show that the influence of dephasing-type interactions, i.e., elastic collisions with a background bath of phonons, critically depends on the nature of the bath modes. In particular, for long-range phonons corresponding to a common bath, the dynamics of the "bright state" (the collective superposition of molecular vibrations coupling to the cavity mode) is effectively decoupled from other system eigenstates. For the case of independent baths (or short-range phonons), incoherent energy transfer occurs between the bright state and the uncoupled dark states. However, these processes are suppressed when the Rabi splitting is larger than the frequency range of the bath modes, as achieved in a recent experiment [Shalabney et al., Nat. Commun. 6, 5981 (2015)]. In both cases, the dynamics can thus be described through a single collective oscillator coupled to a photonic mode, making this system an ideal candidate to explore cavity optomechanics at room temperature.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2015

Extraordinary exciton conductance induced by strong coupling

We demonstrate that exciton conductance in organic materials can be enhanced by several orders of magnitude when the molecules are strongly coupled to an electromagnetic mode. Using a 1D model system, we show how the formation of a collective polaritonic mode allows excitons to bypass the disordered array of molecules and jump directly from one end of the structure to the other. This finding could have important implications in the fields of exciton transistors, heat transport, photosynthesis, and biological systems in which exciton transport plays a key role.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2013

Achieving Giant Magneto-optic Effects with Optical Tamm States in Graphene-based Photonics

We manipulate optical Tamm states in graphene-based photonics to achieve and steer large magneto-optical effects. Here we report the presence of a giant Faraday rotation via a single graphene layer of atomic thickness while keeping a high transmission. The Faraday rotation is enhanced across the interface between two photonic crystals due to the presence of an interface mode, which presents a strong electromagnetic field confinement at the location of the graphene sheet. Our proposed scheme opens a promising avenue to realize high performance graphene magneto-optical devices that can be extended to other two-dimensional structures.

physics.optics↗

arXiv2011

Moulding the flow of surface plasmons using conformal and quasiconformal mapping

In this paper we analyze how Transformation Optics recipes can be applied to control the flow of surface plasmons on metal-dielectric interfaces. We study in detail five different examples: a cylindrical cloak, a beam shifter, a right-angle bend, a lens and a ground-plane cloak. First, we demonstrate that only the modification of the electric permittivity and magnetic permeability in the dielectric side can lead to almost perfect functionalities for surface plasmons. We also show that, thanks to the quasi two-dimensional character of surface plasmons and its inherent polarization, the application of conformal and quasiconformal mapping techniques allows the design of plasmonic devices in which only the isotropic refractive index of the dielectric film needs to be engineered.

physics.optics↗

arXiv2010

Transformation Optics for Plasmonics

A new strategy to control the flow of surface plasmon polaritons at metallic surfaces is presented. It is based on the application of the concept of Transformation Optics to devise the optical parameters of the dielectric medium placed on top of the metal surface. We describe the general methodology for the design of Transformation-Optical devices for surface plasmons and analyze, for proof-of-principle purposes, three representative examples with different functionalities: a beam shifter, a cylindrical cloak and a ground-plane cloak.

physics.optics↗