Ultra-Low-Loss Mid-Infrared Plasmonic Waveguides Based on Multilayer Graphene Metamaterials

Manipulating optical signals in the mid-infrared (mid-IR) range is a highly desired task for applications in chemical sensing, thermal imaging, and subwavelength optical waveguiding. To guide highly confined mid-IR light in photonic chips, graphene-based plasmonics capable of breaking the optical diffraction limit offer a promising solution. However, the propagation lengths of these materials are, to date, limited to approximately 10 µm at the working frequency f = 20 THz. In this study, we proposed a waveguide structure consisting of multilayer graphene metamaterials (MLGMTs). The MLGMTs support the fundamental volume plasmon polariton mode by coupling plasmon polaritons at individual graphene sheets over a silicon nano-rib structure. Benefiting from the high conductivity of the MLGMTs, the guided mode shows ultralow loss compared with that of conventional graphene-based plasmonic waveguides at comparable mode sizes. The proposed design demonstrated propagation lengths of approximately 20 µm (four times the current limitations) at an extremely tight mode area of 10−6A0, where A0 is the diffraction-limited mode area. The dependence of modal characteristics on geometry and material parameters are investigated in detail to identify optimal device performance. Moreover, fabrication imperfections are also addressed to evaluate the robustness of the proposed structure. Moreover, the crosstalk between two adjacent present waveguides is also investigated to demonstrate the high mode confinement to realize high-density on-chip devices. The present design offers a potential waveguiding approach for building tunable and large-area photonic integrated circuits.