Analysis on vertical directional couplers with long range surface plasmons for multilayer optical routing

Abstract

A structure featuring vertical directional coupling of long-range surface plasmon polaritons between strip waveguides at λ = 1.55 μm is investigated with the aim of producing efficient elements that enable optical multilayer routing for 3D photonics. We have introduced a practical computational method to calculate the interaction on the bent part. This method allows us both to assess the importance of the interaction in the bent part and to control it by a suitable choice of the fabrication parameters that helps also to restrain effects due to fabrication issues. The scheme adopted here allows to reduce the insertion losses compared with other planar and multilayer devices.