Electroabsorption of surface plasmon polaritons using quantum wells

Abstract

We studied the modulation of surface plasmon polariton propagation using electroabsorption in quantum wells by simulaiton. SPPs propagate along the interface of a thin Au film and InGaAs/InAlAs multiple quantum wells, which are buried in the vicinity of the Au film. The quantum Stark's shift in the reverse biased quantum wells modulates the absorption of the evanescent field of SPPs. The important characteristics such as propagation loss and the contrast ratio are investigated in this paper, which may propose an approach to SPP modulation via electroabsorption in quantum wells.