Hybrid Dyakonov Surface Waves at Uniaxial Crystal-Temperature-Sensitive Material Interfaces

A theoretical investigation of the temperature-dependent hybrid surface waves guided by the uniaxial crystal-temperature-sensitive material (TSM) interface is carried out in the present study. The uniaxial crystal is realized as a metamaterial having a direction-dependent permittivity tensor, with the optical axis (OA) parallel to the interface. Indium antimonide (InSb) is characterized as TSM, and the temperature-dependent electromagnetic (EM) characteristics of InSb are modeled using the extended Drude model. Analytical and numerical calculations have been performed to obtain the characteristics equation for the temperature-dependent hybrid surface waves. The contour plot technique has been implemented in Mathematica for the computation of dispersion relation. The influence of the temperature and propagation angle on the dispersion curve, effective mode index, phase speed, and propagation length was analyzed. It is reported that the proposed interface supports the two types of surface waves (i.e., (i) pure Dyakonov surface waves (DSWs) for the temperature range (i.e., T∈200,240 K) and (ii) hybrid plasmons waves for the temperature range (i.e., T∈290,360 K)). The computed results can be used to design temperature-assisted optical waveguides, thermo-optical sensors, and chemical sensing/communication devices.