Black Phosphorus Nano-Polarizer with High Extinction Ratio in Visible and Near-Infrared Regime

• Published in: Nanomaterials (Basel, Switzerland) Switzerland), 2019-01, Vol.9 (2), p.168
• Main Authors: Shen, Wanfu, Hu, Chunguang, Huo, Shuchun, Sun, Zhaoyang, Fan, Guofang, Liu, Jing, Sun, Lidong, Hu, Xiaotang
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: black phosphorus; Low-symmetrical 2D materials; nano polarizer; resonance cavity; scattering-matrix calculation
• ISSN: 2079-4991; 2079-4991
• DOI: 10.3390/nano9020168

We study computationally the design of a high extinction ratio nano polarizer based on black phosphorus (BP). A scattering-matrix calculation method is applied to compute the overall polarization extinction ratio along two orthogonal directions. The results reveal that, with a resonance cavity of SiO₂, both BP/ SiO 2 /Si and -BN/BP/ SiO 2 /Si configurations can build a linear polarizer with extinction ratio higher than 16 dB at a polarized wavelength in the range of 400 nm⁻900 nm. The polarization wavelength is tunable by adjusting the thickness of the BP layer while the thicknesses of the isotrocpic layers are in charge of extinction ratios. The additional top layer of -BN was used to prevent BP degradation from oxidation and strengthens the practical applications of BP polarizer. The study shows that the BP/ SiO 2 /Si structure, with a silicon compatible and easy-to-realize method, is a valuable solution when designing polarization functional module in integrated photonics and optical communications circuits.