title: Nanofocusing radially-polarized beams for high-throughput funneling of optical energy to the near field.
abstract: We theoretically show that a weakly-focused radially polarized beam can excite surface-plasmon-polaritons in metal nanowires and nanocones with efficiencies of the order of 90% and large bandwidths. The coupling mechanism relies on the formation of a standing wave on the nanowire facet, which imposes a relationship between the operating wavelength and the nanowire radius. An immediate application of this finding is nanofocusing of optical energy for implementations of ultra-fast and high-throughput linear and nonlinear nanoscopies, optical nanolithographies, quantum nano-optics and photochemistry at the nanoscale.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Physical Chemistry, ETH Zurich, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Xue-Wen
authors.initials: XW
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Vahid
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Sandoghdar
authors.forename: Mario
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Agio
mesh_terms: D003198:Computer Simulation; D017076:Computer-Aided Design; D004735:Energy Transfer; D004867:Equipment Design; D019544:Equipment Failure Analysis; D008027:Light; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D036103:Nanotechnology / Q000295:instrumentation*; D012031:Refractometry / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods; D012542:Scattering, Radiation; D020349:Surface Plasmon Resonance / Q000295:instrumentation*