Low Temperature Physics: 47, 588 (2021); https://doi.org/10.1063/10.0005187
Gyrotropic superlattice as a transformer of light polarizationN. M. Makarov1, S. S. Melnyk2, O. V. Usatenko2, A. A. Shmat’ko3, and V. A. Yampol’skii2,3 1Instituto de Ciencias, Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, Puebla 72570, México 2A. Ya. Usikov Institute for Radiophysics and Electronics of the National Academy of Sciences of UkraineKharkiv 61805, Ukraine 3V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University, Kharkiv 61077, Ukraine Received February 3, 2021 , published online May 26, 2021 Abstract We suggest a novel approach to predict and clarify the transformation of an arbitrarily polarized wave into two circularly polarized ones, based on the peculiar features of their transmission and reflection from a stack with regularly arranged gyrotropic layers. In spite of the fact that in the Faraday geometry gyrotropic media possess four electromagnetic eigenmodes, we have managed to modify the problem to be analytically resolved within the conventional transfer-matrix method. As a result, we have obtained and analyzed the dispersion relation, as well as the transmission and reflection coefficients, which are applicable for any elliptic polarization of a wave irradiating a gyrotropic superlattice with finite number of unit cells. It is shown that there exists a wide range of wave frequency and magneto-optical parameter (proportional to external dc magnetic field) inside of which the wave of given circular polarization is perfectly transmitted, while the wave with the opposite circular polarization is completely reflected. Thus, under certain conditions, the incident plane wave (taken as an appropriate example) splits up into the transmitted and reflected circular waves with mutually inverse rotations. We indicate conditions when a relatively small variation of the magnetization can reverse the polarizations mentioned above. Key words: extraordinary optical transmission, photonics, superlattices, Faraday effect, polarization of light. |