Tunable broadband plasmonic field enhancement on a graphene surface using a normal-incidence plane wave at mid-infrared frequencies

We investigate optical field enhancement for a wide mid-infrared range, originating from the excitation of graphene plasmons, by introducing a graded dielectric grating of varying period underneath a graphene monolayer. Excitation of the plasmonic mode can be achieved by illuminating a normal-incidence plane wave on the gratings due to guided-mode resonance. The gratings of varying period enable the excitation of the plasmonic mode with a very high field enhancement factor (to the order of magnitude of 1000) within a wide spectral band, which leads to the frequency-dependent spatially separated localization of the infrared spectrum modes. We also demonstrate that the excitation position of the plasmonic mode can be freely tuned by varying the thickness of the interlayer as well as the chemical potential of the graphene monolayer. This structure enables the design of two-dimensional plasmonic photonic circuits and metamaterials targeted towards numerous potential applications including optoelectronic detectors, light-harvest devices, on-chip optical interconnects, biosensors, and light-matter interactions.