Strong coupling of single emitters to surface plasmons

Abstract

We propose a method that enables strong, coherent coupling between individual optical emitters and electromagnetic excitations in conducting nanostructures. The excitations are optical plasmons that can be localized to subwavelength dimensions. Under realistic conditions, the tight confinement causes optical emission to be almost entirely directed into the propagating plasmon modes via a mechanism analogous to cavity quantum electrodynamics. We first illustrate this result for the case of a nanowire, before considering the optimized geometry of a nanotip. We describe an application of this technique involving efficient single-photon generation on demand, in which the plasmons are efficiently outcoupled to a dielectric waveguide. Finally, we analyze the effects of increased scattering due to surface roughness on these nanostructures.