Design of a Novel Plasmonic Splitter With Variable Transmissions and Selectable Channels

Abstract

A novel plasmonic power splitter with variable transmissions and selectable channels is presented using hexagonal resonator with inserted silver ellipse. Rotating the silver ellipse to different angles will break the symmetry of structure and change the propagation path of surface plasmon polaritons. The finite-difference time-domain simulation results reveal that the variable transmissions and selectable channels are achieved by rotating the inserted ellipse. Besides elliptical core, other components such as rectangular and triangular core are investigated in detail. It proves that the selection of channels and variable transmissions can be realized when the structural asymmetry is introduced into the hexagonal resonator by rotating the inserted asymmetric core. Furthermore, comparing the simulation results of three different structures, it is found that the power splitter with elliptical core has larger transmission when the output ports is selected and it is easier to adjust the transmission according to the requirements since its error range of rotation angle is larger than the others. Therefore, the power splitter with elliptical core is more suitable for realizing variable transmissions and selectable channels. The proposed device can realize the dynamic control of optical signals with the compact and simple structure. It may potentially be applied in on-chip signal routing and optical networks-on-chip.