Optical chirality without optical activity: How surface plasmons give a twist to light

Light interacts differently with left and right handed three dimensional chiral objects, like helices, and this leads to the phenomenon known as optical activity. Here, by applying a polarization tomography, we show experimentally, for the first time in the visible domain, that chirality has a diffe...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published inOptics express Vol. 16; no. 17; pp. 12559 - 12570
Main Authors Drezet, Aurelien, Genet, Cyriaque, Laluet, Jean-Yves, Ebbesen, Thomas W
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States 18.08.2008
Subjects
Computer Simulation
Light
Models, Theoretical
Refractometry - methods
Scattering, Radiation
Surface Plasmon Resonance - methods
Online AccessGet full text

Cover

More Information
Summary:Light interacts differently with left and right handed three dimensional chiral objects, like helices, and this leads to the phenomenon known as optical activity. Here, by applying a polarization tomography, we show experimentally, for the first time in the visible domain, that chirality has a different optical manifestation for twisted planar nanostructured metallic objects acting as isolated chiral metaobjects. Our analysis demon-strate how surface plasmons, which are lossy bidimensional electromagnetic waves propagating on top of the structure, can delocalize light information in the just precise way for giving rise to this subtle effect.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
content type line 23
ISSN:1094-4087
1094-4087
DOI:10.1364/oe.16.012559