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Title: Epitaxial mid-IR nanophotonic optoelectronics

There are a range of fundamental challenges associated with scaling optoelectronic devices down to the nano-scale, and the past decades have seen significant research dedicated to the development of sub-diffraction-limit optical devices, often relying on the plasmonic response of metal structures. At the longer wavelengths associated with the mid-infrared, dramatic changes in the optical response of traditional nanophotonic materials, reduced efficiency optoelectronic active regions, and a host of deleterious and/or parasitic effects makes nano-scale optoelectronics at micro-scale wavelengths particularly challenging. In this Perspective, we describe recent work leveraging a class of infrared plasmonic materials, highly doped semiconductors, which not only support sub-diffraction-limit plasmonic modes at long wavelengths, but which can also be integrated into a range of optoelectronic device architectures. We discuss how the wavelength-dependent optical response of these materials can serve a number of different photonic device designs, including dielectric waveguides, epsilon-near-zero dynamic optical devices, cavity-based optoelectronics, and plasmonic device architectures. We present recent results demonstrating that the highly doped semiconductor class of materials offers the opportunity for monolithic, all-epitaxial, device architectures out-performing current state of the art commercial devices, and discuss the perspectives and promise of these materials for infrared nanophotonic optoelectronics.

 
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Award ID(s):
1926187
NSF-PAR ID:
10367894
Author(s) / Creator(s):
 ;  
Publisher / Repository:
American Institute of Physics
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Applied Physics Letters
Volume:
120
Issue:
22
ISSN:
0003-6951
Page Range / eLocation ID:
Article No. 220501
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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