Electro-optic polymer film light modulator model based on grating-coupled long-range surface plasmon resonance

An electro-optic (EO) polymer film light modulator based on grating-coupled long-range surface plasmon resonance is proposed and numerically investigated. Near the resonance condition, the incident light can be absorbed to excite the surface plasmon on both sides of a thin metal layer, sandwiched between a cladding layer and the EO polymer. The reflected light intensity is highly sensitive to the refractive index of the EO polymer. For the structure with optimal thickness, the modulator is able to vary the reflectance from 0 to 0.6 by applying 10.61 V across a 5 µm thick EO polymer film with a linear electro-optic coefficient of 200 pm V − 1.