title: Nonlocal ponderomotive nonlinearity in plasmonics.
abstract: We analyze an inherent nonlinearity of surface plasmon polaritons at the interface of Fermi-Dirac metal plasma, stemming from the depletion of electron density in high-intensity regions. The derived optical nonlinear coefficients are comparable with the experimental values for metals. We calculate the dispersion relations for the nonlinear propagation of high-intensity surface plasmon polaritons, predicting a nonlinearity-induced cutoff and vanishing group velocity.
authors.affiliation: Department of Electrical Engineering, Technion, Haifa 32000, Israel. gpasha@tx.technion.ac.il
authors.forename: Pavel
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Ginzburg
authors.forename: Alex
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Hayat
authors.forename: Nikolai
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Berkovitch
authors.forename: Meir
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Orenstein