Perfect Optical Absorbers by All-Dielectric Photonic Crystal/Metal Heterostructures Due to Optical Tamm State

Abstract

In this study, we theoretically and experimentally investigated the perfect optical absorptance of a photonic heterostructure composed of a truncated all-dielectric photonic crystal (PC) and a thick metal film in the visible regions. The three simulated structures could achieve narrow-band perfect optical absorption at wavelengths of 500 nm, 600 nm, and 700 nm, respectively. Based on the measured experimental results, the three experimental structures achieved over 90% absorption at wavelengths of 489 nm, 604 nm, and 675 nm, respectively. The experimental results agreed well with the theoretical values. According to electromagnetic field intensity distributions at the absorption wavelengths, the physical mechanism of perfect absorption was derived from the optical Tamm state (OTS). The structure was simple, and the absorption characteristics were not significantly affected by the thickness of the thick metal layer, which creates convenience in the preparation of the structure. In general, the proposed perfect absorbers have exciting prospects in solar energy, optical sensor technology, and other related fields.

Tamm plasmon polariton in planar structures: A brief overview and applications

“…Liu et al [126] have theoretically and experimentally demonstrated single and multi-band near perfect absorber by using simple metal and a 1D PC based structure. Perfect absorbers for visible region are observed in a simple photonic heterostructures composed of a truncated all-dielectric photonic crystal and thick metal film [127] whose schematic is shown in Fig. 10(a).…”

Enhanced Nonlinearity of Epsilon‐Near‐Zero Indium Tin Oxide Nanolayers with Tamm Plasmon‐Polariton States

“…In order to overcome these limitations, a special type of surface polariton state, known as Tamm plasmon-polariton (TPP), was recently proposed [47] and experimentally demonstrated in 2008 by Sasin et al [48] This surface wave is the optical analog of the electronic Tamm states that form on the surface of a crystalline material due to the breaking of its translational symmetry. [49] In recent times, photonic TPP structures have been utilized for the demonstration of tunable perfect absorbers for vis-NIR wavelengths, [50][51][52][53][54] Tamm lasers with tailored emission properties, [55][56][57] thermal emitters, [58,59] temperature sensors, [60][61][62] and real time chemical/bio sensors. [63][64][65][66] Photonic TPP structures are composed of a distributed Bragg reflector (DBR) terminated by a thin metal film.…”

Investigation and Analysis of Absorption in One-Dimensional Dielectric-Metal Photonic Crystal Absorbers

“…Various optical absorbers have been developed in recent years based on PhCs have been reported, most of which are based on all-dielectric PhC structures. For example, an absorber utilizing an all-dielectric PhC structure and a metallic substrate utilizing the optical Tamm state (OTS) was reported by Lu et al [29]. The absorber shows high absorption of 90% in the visible region.…”