Circuits with light at the nanoscale

Abstract

Imagine circuit elements so small that you could fit many of them in a tiny microscale volume (e.g., a cell)! Imagine that such circuits could work with light at the nanoscale instead of electricity! What could you do with such optical nanocircuits? Would you be able to use them in wireless gadgets at nanoscales, like a “nanoradio”, that may connect our nanoworlds? Could these tiny optical nanocircuits be coupled with biological entities and thus provide nanoscale sensors? The fields of metamaterials and plasmonic optics may provide road maps for such futuristic nanocircuits and wireless nanosystems and sensors. We have been developing and investigating some of the fundamental concepts and theories, and key features of such metaplasmonic structures, devices, and circuits. These circuit elements and components may be envisioned as a tapestry of nanostructures of sizes much smaller than the wavelengths of light. This field, for which I have coined the term metactronics, addresses metamaterial-inspired optical nanocircuits and nanosystems (See references below).. In my group, a variety of ideas and paradigms for nanocircuit functions, optical antennas and sensors for beam shaping and photonic wireless at the nanoscale, optical nanoscopy, nanospectrometer for molecular spectroscopy, cloaking of particles, nanotagging and barcodes based on these optical circuits are being studied. In this talk, I will give an overview of these studies, present insights into these findings, and forecast future ideas and road maps in these areas. For more information, please see the references below.