Observation of optical spin symmetry breaking in nanoapertures.

Gorodetski, Yuri; Shitrit, Nir; Bretner, Itay; Kleiner, Vladimir; Hasman, Erez · Nano Lett · 2009

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Observation of a spin symmetry breaking effect in plasmonic nanoscale structures due to spin-orbit interaction is presented. We demonstrate a nanoplasmonic structure which exhibits a crucial role of an angular momentum (AM) selection rule in a light-surface plasmon scattering process. In our experiment, the intrinsic AM (spin) of the incident radiation is coupled to the extrinsic momentum (orbital AM) of the surface plasmons via spin-orbit interaction. Due to this effect, we achieved a spin-controlled enhanced transmission through a coaxial nanoaperture.