Surface plasmon routing along right angle bent metal strips

Abstract
An efficient routing of surface plasmon polaritons (SPP) is of fundamental importance in the development of SPP-based photonics. This paper reports that microgratings acting as Bragg mirrors can guide SPP along metal stripes waveguides featuring 90° bents. The measurement of the mirrors efficiency, performed by means of photon scanning tunneling microscopy, shows that bent losses as low as 1.9dB can be achieved. Finally, we demonstrate operating SPP beamsplitters obtained by an appropriate design of the Bragg mirrors constituting elements.