Low-loss, centimeter-scale plasmonic metasurface for ultrafast optoelectronics

Plasmonics can dramatically improve the radiative properties of fluorescent materials by precisely tailoring the local density of states, but has largely been dismissed for practical optoelectronic applications due to losses and lack of scalability to macroscopic areas. Here, we demonstrate a low-loss plasmonic metasurface that can collect fast-modulated light with a 3 dB bandwidth exceeding 14 GHz and a 120º acceptance angle and convert it to a directional source with, to the best of our knowledge, a record-high overall efficiency of ∼ 30 % . This large-area metasurface composed of fluorescent dye coupled to nanopatch antennas, exhibits a 910-fold increase in the overall fluorescence and a 133-fold emission rate enhancement—values previously only observable for isolated, highly optimized single nanostructures. Critical for future applications ranging from optoelectronics to biosensing, this metasurface was created over macroscopic areas with scalable techniques and the performance was validated over centimeter-scale regions. In particular, we believe this approach shows promise for the burgeoning field of visible/near-infrared wireless communications, where radical new designs and materials are needed for ultrafast, efficient, omnidirectional detectors and incoherent sources.