Abstract

Surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) are electromagnetic surface waves that travel along the boundary of a metal and a dielectric medium. They can be generated when freely propagating light is scattered by structural metallic features like gratings or slits. In plasmonics, SPPs are manipulated, amplified, or routed before being converted back into light by a second scattering event. In this process the light acquires a dynamic phase, and possibly an additional geometric phase associated with polarization changes. We examine the possibility that SPPs can mediate a geometric Pancharatnam-Berry phase, and find that this is indeed the case. Moreover, the geometric phase is shown to survive the light → SPP → light process.

© 2017 Optical Society of America