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Broadband optical waveguide modulators based

on strongly coupled hybrid graphene and metal
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Cite this: DOI: 10.1039/c8nr09157a

nanoribbons for near-infrared applications
Longfang Ye, *a Kehan Sui,a Yong Zhangb and Qing Huo Liu c

Received 13th November 2018,
Accepted 28th January 2019
DOI: 10.1039/c8nr09157a
rsc.li/nanoscale
In this paper, we numerically demonstrate a variety of broadband optical waveguide modulators based on
the hybrid surface plasmon polariton (HSPP) concept for near-infrared applications. The modulator is
composed of strongly coupled double-layer graphene and double rectangle cross-sectional metal nano-
ribbons separated by three Al2O3 spacers, which are interpolated in a SiO2 waveguide. Owing to the
unique strong coupling of HSPPs between metal nanoribbons, the subwavelength confinement, the in-
plane electric field component, the light-graphene interaction, and the modulation effect of the modu-
lator are significantly enhanced. The results show the proposed modulator achieves an outstanding per-
formance with a modulation depth (MD) over 2.3 dB μm−1 and a small normalized mode area of ∼10−5 in
a wide range of wavelength from 1.3 to 1.8 μm. By optimizing the separation of the double rectangle
metal nanoribbons at the telecommunication wavelength of 1.55 μm, the modulator exhibits a high MD of
3.12 dB μm−1, a small footprint of 1.8 μm2, an ultra-wide 3 dB modulation bandwidth of 380.23 GHz, and
an ultra-low energy consumption of 29.39 fJ per bit. Furthermore, we also demonstrate a modulator
based on two properly apart semicircular (rhombus) metal nanoribbons with a drastically enhanced MD of
11.3 (6.32) dB μm−1 at 1.55 μm. Benefitting from the strong subwavelength confinement and excellent
broadband modulation performance, the proposed optical waveguide modulators offer a significant
potential to realize various long-wave near-infrared integrated modulators, interconnects and opto-
electronic devices.

1. Introduction
Long-wave near-infrared spectrum, with the wavelength
ranging from 1.1 to 2.526 μm, has been extensively applied
in imaging, sensing, spectroscopy, and communications.1–4 As
one of the key devices for near-infrared communication and
signal processing, optical modulators have attracted increasing
attention in recent years. Various silicon (Si) optical modu-
lators have been achieved by converting a change of refractive
index into amplitude, phase or polarization modulation
though infusing carrier, depositing, and chemical doping,
plasma dispersion effect, or by using hybrid silicon and other
photonic materials.5–7 Although the bandwidth, speed, foot-
print, and energy consumption of silicon modulators have
been improved dramatically in the past few years, the perform-
a
Institute of Electromagnetics and Acoustics, and Department of Electronic Science,
Xiamen University, Xiamen 361005, China. E-mail: lfye@xmu.edu.cn
b
School of Electronic Science and Engineering, University of Electronic Science and
Technology of China, Chengdu, Sichuan 611731, China
c
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Duke University,
Durham 27708, USA
ance metrics of the modulators are still very limited to meet
the significant demands of the emerging optical interconnects
and communications. On the other hand, owing to the diffrac-
tion limit, the silicon modulators usually exhibit weak mode
confinement in the scale of λ/n, where n is the relative refrac-
tive index of silicon.8 These aspects greatly restrict the appli-
cations of the silicon modulators in highly centralized broad-
band optical transmission, interconnection, modulation, and
integration.
Graphene is a two-dimensional carbon nanomaterial com-
posed of a carbon atom and a sp2 hybrid orbital to form a
hexagonal honeycomb lattice.9 Graphene has excellent electri-
cal and optical properties, good thermal conductivity, stability,
and excellent carrier mobility, making it an excellent electro-
optic material for modulators.10–14 Graphene supports very
confined surface plasmon polaritons with long propagation
length and low crosstalk in a wide spectrum ranging from
terahertz to near-infrared regions, which can be extensively
applied in spectroscopy, biosensing, imaging and
communications.15–18 Furthermore, the complex conductivity
of graphene can be easily adjusted by chemical and electro-
static doping, which for example, can be realized by applying a

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gate bias voltage to the graphene layers.19 The combination of
graphene and waveguide structures opens up a new research
direction of graphene-based optical waveguide modulators.
Recently, many researchers have theoretically and experi-
mentally demonstrated various graphene-based modulators.
For example, Liu et al. first experimentally demonstrated
single- and double-layer graphene optical waveguide modu-
lators by integrating the graphene layer(s) on a silicon sub-
strate with an MD of ∼0.1–0.16 dB μm−1.20,21 Ansell et al. also
experimentally presented a hybrid graphene plasmonic wave-
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guide modulator with a low MD of 0.03 dB μm−1.22 To improve
the modulation performance, many modulator designs with
the graphene layer placed at the maximum electric field
location of the waveguides have been numerically demon-
strated. For example, Phatak et al. proposed a graphene-on-
silicon slot waveguide modulator, which achieves an MD of
0.144 dB μm−1.23 Kovacevic et al. also presented a graphene
modulator on a silicon waveguide with an MD of 0.28 dB μm−1.24
Shah et al. reported on a modulator using graphene-
on-D-microfiber configuration with an MD of 0.3 dB μm−1.25
And Kim et al. designed a double-layer graphene modulator
based on inverted-rib-type silicon waveguide achieving an MD
of 0.42 dB μm−1.26 Furthermore, Wang et al. proposed a plas-
monic modulator on a groove-structured metasurface covered
by a single-layer graphene sheet enabling the major electric
field parallel to the graphene layer to enhance the light-
graphene interaction, and the simulated MD of 0.4 dB μm−1 is
achieved.27 Moreover, strong modulation capability is also
theoretically obtained in some graphene modulator designs,
in which the graphene is modeled as an isotropic material and
the so-called epsilon-near-zero effect in graphene is
observed.28–31 However, it should be noted that graphene is a
one-atom-thick 2D material and only its in-plane conductivity
can be tuned by the electrostatic doping. Simply modeling
single layer graphene as a 3D effective isotropic material may
lead to an overestimation of the modulation depth of the
modulators.27 In fact, some numerical and experimental
results have verified that assuming the graphene as an aniso-
tropic material with conductivity dependent in-plane permit-
tivity and constant out-of-plane permittivity or as a 2D surface
conductivity layer without thickness is more accurate.22,27,32,33
Despite the recent progress, most of the recently reported con-
ventional graphene-based modulators demonstrate a limited
modulation depth (usually less than 0.5 dB μm−1 due to the
small light-graphene interaction), area efficiency, and energy
consumption performance. Therefore, it is still very challen-
ging to explore the full potential of graphene and achieve
broadband modulator with much higher modulation depth,
smaller device footprint, and lower energy consumption across
a wide bandwidth of the near-infrared region.
In this paper, we proposed a broadband optical waveguide
modulator based on the HSPP concept for near-infrared appli-
cations. The modulator is composed of strongly coupled
double-layer graphene and double rectangle metal nano-
ribbons separated by three Al2O3 spacers, which are inter-
polated in a SiO2 waveguide. By horizontally translating the
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metal nanoribbons upon and below the double graphene
layers, the in-plane electric field components of HSPPs of the
graphene layers and the light-graphene interaction are greatly
increased, resulting in strong subwavelength confinement and
excellent modulation effects. To study the characteristics of
the modulators, we simulate and discuss the electric field dis-
tributions, attenuation constant, normalized mode area, the
effective index Re(Neff ) in the near-infrared wavelength. It is
found that by tuning the graphene chemical potential from 0
to 0.65 eV, the modulator achieves outstanding modulation
performance with an MD above 2.3 dB μm−1 and strong sub-
wavelength confinement with a small normalized mode area
of ∼10−5 in the whole wavelength between 1.3–1.8 μm.
Furthermore, the effects of the separation and shapes of
double metal nanoribbons on the modulation performance
are also investigated. It is found that by optimizing the separ-
ation of the double rectangle metal nanoribbons at 1.55 μm,
the modulator with a high MD of 3.12 dB μm−1, a small foot-
print of 1.8 μm2, an ultra-wide 3 dB modulation bandwidth of
380.23 GHz, and an ultra-low energy consumption of 29.39 fJ
per bit is achieved. By using two properly apart semicircular
and rhombus metal nanoribbons in the modulators, drasti-
cally enhanced MDs of 11.3 and 6.32 dB μm−1 at 1.55 μm are
demonstrated. Finally, a comparison of the performance of the
proposed modulator and some recently reported graphene-
based modulators are presented. This study provides a new
route to designing graphene-based hybrid plasmonic wave-
guide modulators for highly efficient broadband modulation
and may offer some interesting solutions for long-wave near-
infrared interconnects and communications.
2. Design, simulation, and
consideration
The schematic configuration and cross-section view of the pro-
posed near-infrared broadband waveguide modulator are dis-
played in Fig. 1(a) and (b), respectively. The modulator is com-
posed of double graphene layers and double rectangle metal
nanoribbons separated by three Al2O3 spacers, which are
interpolated in a SiO2 ridge waveguide placed on a buffer layer
and a substrate layer. In this study, the substrate layer is
assumed to be a silicon with a relative permittivity (εSi) of 11.7
and a thickness (s) of 100 nm, and the buffer layer is assumed
to be a Topas34,35 with a relative permittivity (εTopas) of 2.35
and a thickness ( p) of 800 nm. The SiO2 ridge waveguide has a
square cross-sectional dimension with the side (l) of 600 nm
and a relative permittivity (εSiO2) of 2.09. And each Al2O3 spacer
has a relative permittivity (εAl2O3) of 2.63 and a thickness (t ) of
2 nm (ref. 36 and 37) to prevent graphene from being chemi-
cally doped by other materials. The double metal nanoribbons
are assumed to be silver (Ag) with a relative permittivity
obtained from the Lorentz–Drude model.38,39 The double
nanoribbons have identical dimensions with the width (w) and
height (h) of 200 and 25 nm, respectively. They are separately
placed upon the upper graphene layer and below the lower gra-
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Fig. 1 The schematic configuration of the proposed near-infrared broadband waveguide modulator. (a) 3D schematic of the modulator; (b) cross-
sectional view of the modulator, where the geometric parameters of the waveguide are set as s = 100 nm, p = 800 nm, l = 600 nm, t = 2 nm, w =
200 nm, h = 25 nm.

phene layer in the SiO2 waveguide with a horizontal edge sep- stant α, normalized mode area Am, and modulation depth
aration g, which is the distance between the right edge of the MD,50–52 as follows,
upper metal nanoribbon and the left edge of the lower metal
N eff ¼ k=k0 ; ð2Þ
nanoribbon. To achieve near-infrared modulation, a gate
voltage Vg is applied to the graphene layers, acting as a parallel 10ImðNeff Þ4π
α¼ ; ð3Þ
plate capacitor, to control the graphene conductivity via λ0 ln 10
electrostatic doping effect, as illustrated in Fig. 1(a). It should Ð1
be pointed out that the graphene-based waveguide modulator Aeff 1 1 W ðx; yÞdxdy
Am ¼ ¼ ; ð4Þ
can be fabricated using the state-of-the-art nanoimprint litho- A0 A0 max½Wðx; yÞ
graphy and graphene synthesis and transfer techniques.40–43  
1 d½ωε0 εr ðx; yÞ 1
In this study, we use the commercial software COMSOL W ðx; yÞ ¼ Re jEðrÞj2 þ μ0 jHðrÞj2 ; ð5Þ
2 dω 2
Multiphysics to calculate and analyze the properties of the pro-
posed modulator. As we know, graphene can be either effec- MD ¼ αðOFFÞ  αðONÞ; ð6Þ
tively modeled as an equivalent 3D anisotropic permittivity
where the propagation constant k = β + iα, β is the phase con-
material with a thickness or as a 2D surface conductivity layer
stant, Re(Neff ) and Im(Neff ) are the real and imaginary parts of
without thickness. Owing to the less demand of mesh number
Neff, Aeff is the effective mode area, W(x, y) is the energy
in simulation, it is more efficient and more desirable to model
density, α(OFF) and α(ON) denote the values of α at “ON” and
graphene as a 2D surface conductivity layer.32,33,44 Therefore,
“OFF” states of the waveguide modulator; k0, λ0, and A0 = λ02/4
we assume graphene as a 0-thick surface conductivity layer in
are the propagation constant, the wavelength, and the diffrac-
related modulator simulations. The surface conductivity σg
tion limited mode area in free space, respectively. In the
(Unit: S) of a single layer of graphene is calculated by the Kubo
COMSOL simulations, we use the mode analysis solver to
formula,45,46 as follows,
calculate Neff, α, Am, MD, and the field distributions of the pro-
ð1   posed modulator on xoy plane, and use the frequency domain
je2 @fd ðξ; μc ; TÞ @fd ðξ; μc ; TÞ
σ g ðω; μc ; Γ; TÞ ¼  solver to simulate the field distributions of the modulator
πℏ ðω  j2ΓÞ 0
2
@ξ @ξ
ð along propagation direction (z-axis). In both cases, scattering
je2 ðω  j2Γ Þ 1 fd ðξ; μc ; TÞ  fd ðξ; μc ; TÞ
ξdξ  dξ; boundaries enough far away from the model center are
πℏ2 0 ðω  j2ΓÞ2  4ξ=ℏ2
assigned to all directions approximately mimic the free space
ð1Þ and the thermo-optic effect of the modulator is neglected.

where ω is the angular frequency, μc is the chemical potential

or Fermi level, T is temperature, the scattering rate Γ = 2τ−1,
the relaxation time τ = μμc/(evF2), μ is the mobility, vF is the
Fermi velocity, e is the electron charge, ξ is energy, ℏ is the
reduced Planck constant, kB is the Boltzmann constant, and
the Fermi–Dirac distribution fd(ξ,μc,T ) = (e(ξ−μc)/kBT + 1)−1. By
considering the experimentally available graphene carrier
mobility at room temperature, here, we set τ = 0.5 ps and T =
300 K.47–49 To quantify the characteristics of the proposed
modulator, we define the effective index Neff, attenuation con-
3. Results and discussion
First of all, we present the dependence of graphene surface
conductivity σg on the chemical potential μc and wavelength λ
in the long-wave near-infrared spectrum, as shown in Fig. 2.
Note that the real part of the graphene conductivity Re(σg)
determines the imaginary part of the equivalent relative per-
mittivity Im(εg), which reflects the attenuation of graphene.19
And the imaginary part of the graphene conductivity Im(σg)

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Fig. 2 Dependence of the graphene surface conductivity σg on the chemical potential μc and incident wavelength λ. (a) Re(σg) as a function of μc
and λ; (b) Im(σg) as a function of μc and λ.

determines the real part of the relative permittivity Re(εg),
which reveals the metallic and dielectric properties of gra-
phene. Fig. 2(a) shows that Re(σg) is very sensitive to μc. For
example, as μc varies from 0 to 0.65 eV, Re(σg) decreases drasti-
cally from 60.7 to 0.17 μS (over 350 times) at λ = 1.55 μm.
Fig. 2(b) shows that the sign of Im(σg) varies at certain given
values of the λ and μc. In particular, Im(σg) changes from posi-
tive to negative by adjusting μc from 0 to 0.65 eV with the sign
switching point μc of 0.51 eV at λ = 1.55 μm, which implies the
material properties of graphene transforming from “metallic
graphene” to “dielectric graphene”. The great tunability of σg
enables a huge modulation potential of graphene in the pro-
posed devices.
To study the performance of the proposed modulator, we
discuss the electric field distributions, attenuation constant α,
normalized mode area Am and real part of the effective index
Re(Neff ) in the near-infrared wavelength below. The geometric
parameters are all the same as those shown in the caption of
Fig. 1. Fig. 3(a) and (b) show the electric field magnitude distri-
butions of the HSPPs, |E| (Unit: V m−1), of the modulator at

Fig. 3 The simulated |E|, α, Re(Neff ) and Am of the proposed modulator. (a) and (b) are the |E| distributions at λ = 1.55 μm with g = 0 and −100 nm,
respectively. (c)–(e) are the α, Re(Neff ), and Am as a function of μc with λ fixed as 1.3, 1.55, 1.8 μm and g fixed as 0 nm, respectively.

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the wavelength (λ) of 1.55 μm under different silver nano-
ribbon separation (g) values of 0 and −100 nm, respectively. It
is found that the electric fields are extremely concentrated in
the nanoscale region between two silver nanoribbons.
Especially, much stronger subwavelength mode confinement
is observed in the modulator with g = 0 nm than that with g =
−100 nm. It is remarkable that the major electric fields
between double silver nanoribbons are polarized in y-direction
for g = −100 nm. However, for g = 0 nm, the electric field com-
ponent in x-direction (Ex) of the HSPPs ( parallel to graphene
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plane) of the modulator is significantly increased and there-
fore, the light-graphene interaction and modulation effects are
strongly enhanced. By considering this point, we fix g as 0 nm
and calculate α, Re(Neff ), and Am of the modulator as a func-
tion of μc with different λ of 1.3, 1.55, and 1.8 μm, as shown in
Fig. 3(c)–(e). As clearly shown in Fig. 3(c), the values of α
decrease with λ increasing from 1.3 to 1.8 μm, and all α curves
show a similar decreasing trend as μc increasing from 0 to 0.65
eV. Here, to discuss electro-absorptive modulation, we initially
assign 0.65 and 0 eV as “ON” and “OFF” states of this modu-
lator, respectively. By switching μc from 0 to 0.65 eV, the
highest, moderate, lowest MDs achieve about 3.0, 2.62 and 2.3
dB μm−1 at λ = 1.3, 1.55, and 1.8 μm, respectively. As shown in
Fig. 3(d), Re(Neff ) of the HSPPs at λ of 1.55 μm first increases
from 3.04 to its peak 3.07 and then decreases to 2.98 as μc
increases from 0 to 0.40 and then to 0.65 eV. Similar trends for
Fig. 4 (a) Comparison of the attenuation α of the modulators composed of different materials. (b)–(d) Dependence of α, Re(Neff ), and Am of the
proposed modulator with graphene and silver nanoribbons on the wavelength λ ranging from 1.3 to 1.8 μm with g = 0 nm, respectively.
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Re(Neff ) at λ of 1.3 and 1.8 μm are observed, where higher
Re(Neff ), implying stronger field confinement, is obtained at
smaller λ. Owing to very subwavelength confinement of the
modulator, as shown in Fig. 3(e), Am on the order of 10−5 is
achieved under different values of λ with μc ranging from 0 to
0.65 eV. In addition, it is worth mentioning that a fractional
Re(Neff ) change, [Re(Neff )max − Re(Neff )min]/Re(Neff )min × 100%,
of the proposed modulator at λ of 1.55 μm reaches 3% between
0.40 and 0.65 eV. Therefore, the proposed modulator is able to
achieve both strong electro-absorptive and electro-refractive
effects simultaneously, which offer great potential applications
in various amplitude and phase modulators. In order to sim-
plify the analysis, we only focus on the electro-absorptive
modulation performance in the following discussion.
To further study broadband properties of the modulator, we
calculate the dependence of α, Re(Neff ), and Am on the operat-
ing wavelength ranging from 1.3 to 1.8 μm under different μc
of 0 and 0.65 eV, as shown in Fig. 4. Here, to better understand
the attenuation mechanism of the modulator, we first
compare the attenuation α of the modulator composed of
different materials as a function of wavelength λ ranging from
1.3 to 1.8 μm in Fig. 4(a). The total attenuation of the proposed
modulator is mainly caused by the attenuation of the graphene
layers and the silver nanoribbons owing to all dielectric
materials are assumed to be lossless in simulations. It is
remarkable that the α of the double graphene layers obtained
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from the modulator composed of graphene and perfect elec-
tronic conductor (PEC) nanoribbons is almost independent of
the operating wavelength at 0 and 0.65 eV. However, because
of the wavelength dependent attenuation from the dispersive
silver, the whole modulator demonstrates a clear wavelength
dependent attenuation. Moreover, as the α of the double gra-
phene layers at 0.65 eV is close to 0, the α of the modulator
without graphene is close to the α of the modulator with gra-
phene at 0.65 eV. As shown in Fig. 4(b)–(d), all α, Re(Neff ), and
Am of the proposed modulator with graphene and silver nano-
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ribbons show a clear declining trend with λ increasing. In the
whole bandwidth between 1.3 and 1.8 μm, as shown in
Fig. 4(b), the proposed modulator is able to achieve broadband
modulation with MD of above 2.3 dB μm−1 at λ = 1.8 μm and 3
dB μm−1 peak modulation depth at λ = 1.3 μm. Fig. 4(c) shows
that the values of Re(Neff ) at μc = 0.65 eV are larger than those
at μc = 0 eV in the whole bandwidth. And Fig. 4(d) shows that
the values of Am also maintain near to the 10−5 in the wave-
length ranging from 1.3 to 1.8 μm under the different μc,
which is much smaller than the conventional silicon-based
waveguide modulators.5,8 This characteristic facilitates the
application of this modulator for miniaturized near-infrared
interconnect devices and communication systems.
Next, we discuss the effects of the separation (g) of double
rectangle cross-sectional silver nanoribbons on the character-
istics of the proposed modulator with λ fixed as 1.55 μm. As
shown in Fig. 3(a) and (b), g is a critical geometric parameter
in determining the field distributions of the modulation. By
increasing g from −200 to 200 nm, the double silver nano-
ribbons will move from the center pension to the left and right
sides of the SiO2 waveguide. Fig. 5(a) shows the dependence of
α and MD on g ranging from −200 to 200 nm while remaining
all other geometric parameters fixed. It is clear that g has a
great effect on α, where α reaches to its peak of 3.78 dB μm−1
at “OFF” state with μc = 0 eV and relatively low value of 0.66
dB μm−1 at “ON” state with μc = 0.65 eV. Notably, when the
modulator operating at “ON” state with g = 200 nm, α reaches
to its lowest value of 0.27 dB μm−1, which is valuable for long-
range transmission in the long-wave near-infrared spectrum.
Fig. 5 (a)–(c) Dependence of α, Re(Neff ), and Am on the separation g with the μc fixed as 0 and 0.65 eV at λ = 1.55 μm, respectively. The insets in (a)
are the Ex distributions udder different g of −200, 5, and 200 nm, respectively.
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The MD increases from the lowest value of 0.09 dB μm−1 at g =
−200 nm to the highest value of 3.12 dB μm−1 at g = 5 nm, and
then decreases to 0.70 dB μm−1 at g = 200 nm. The phenom-
enon can be attributed to the different field distributions of
the modulator with a different value of g. When g = −200 nm,
the electric field of the HSPPs is dominantly polarized along
y-direction between double silver nanoribbons. The in-plane
electric field component (Ex) of the HSPPs is very tiny, as
shown in the top inset of Fig. 5(a), resulting in the lowest light-
graphene interaction and MD. However, the (Ex) of the HSPPs
of the modulator increases with g increasing, and reaches the
highest value with optimal g of 5 nm, as shown in the middle
inset in Fig. 5(a), where large electromagnetic coupling and
light-graphene interaction are achieved. As g further increases
to an even high positive value of 200 nm, the coupling and
light-graphene interaction gradually decrease, as shown in the
bottom inset in Fig. 5(a), and the corresponding MD also
declines to the small value of 0.7 dB μm−1. Then, we studied
the dependence of Re(Neff ) and Am on g at λ = 1.55 μm. As
shown in Fig. 5(b), the values of Re(Neff ) at different μc = 0 and
0.65 eV are very close to each other and exhibit a decreasing
trend by varying the g from −200 to 200 nm. Fig. 5(c) shows Am
as a function of g at different μc. It is clear that both Am curves
drop and then rise with g increasing. And the minimum values
of Am for both μc = 0 and 0.65 eV appear at g = 0 nm, where the
strongest HSPPs coupling and field confinement are achieved.
Then, we investigate the effects of the shapes of double
silver nanoribbons on the modulation performance of the pro-
posed modulator. As we know, sharp wedge tips can be used
to achieve strong SPPs enhancement and confinement.22 For
example, here, we select a semicircular and a rhombus as the
new cross-sectional shapes for double silver nanoribbons
instead of the rectangle one. Fig. 6(a) and (b) show the simu-
lated α as a function of μc and MD as a function of g for the
modulator with double semicircular metal nanoribbons at λ =
1.55 μm. The values of the semicircular radius (r) are assumed
to be 10, 50, and 100 nm, the separation g is set as 0 nm while
keeping all other parameters the same as those shown the
caption of Fig. 1. In this case, with μc varying from 0 to 0.65 eV,
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Fig. 6 The properties of the modulators with semicircular and rhombus silver nanoribbons at the wavelength λ = 1.55 μm. (a) Dependence of α on
μc with g = 0 nm, and (b) dependence of MD on g for the modulator with semicircular nanoribbons. (c) Dependence of α on μc with g = 0 nm, and
(d) dependence of MD on g for the modulator with rhombus nanoribbons.
α decreases from 12, 3 and 2.6 dB μm−1 to 3, 0.65 and 0.45
dB μm−1 for r = 10, 50 and 100 nm, respectively. Therefore, the
MD of 9 dB μm−1 can be achieved for r = 10 nm, which is dras-
tically superior to the modulator with double rectangle cross-
sectional silver nanoribbons. Fig. 6(b) shows that for r =
10 nm, the MD can further reach the maximum of 11.3 dB μm−1
at g = 6 nm, where the largest light-graphene interaction
is achieved, as shown in the inset of this figure. However, for
the larger r of 50 nm and 100 nm, the sizes of the semicircular
silver nanoribbons are comparable to the size of the previously
demonstrated modulator with rectangle silver nanoribbons.
Therefore, similar MD values of around 3 dB μm−1 are
obtained. Likewise, we calculate α as a function of μc and MD
as a function of g for the modulator with double rhombus
metal nanoribbons at λ = 1.55 μm, as shown in Fig. 6(c)
and (d). We assume rhombus side (u) of 100 nm while keeping
all other parameters the same as the previous modulator struc-
tures. The effects of different apex angle θ on modulator per-
formance are also compared. By varying the μc from 0 to
0.65 eV, α decreases from 7, 3.47, 2.39, 1.76, and 1.56 dB μm−1
to 1.3, 0.55, 0.44, 0.47, and 0.78 dB μm−1 for θ = 30°, 60°, 90°,
120°, and 150°, as shown in Fig. 6(c). This phenomenon is
attributed to the stronger the SPPs coupling effect and light-
graphene interaction occurred at the sharper wedge. Similarly,
as shown in Fig. 6(d), the modulator is more sensitive to g
changes with the apex angle θ of 30° than other higher values.
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When g gradually increases from −50 nm to 50 nm, the Ex of
the HSPPs increases to its maximum at g = 4 nm, and then
gradually decreases again due to the lowing EM coupling.
Therefore, all MD curves experience an increasing and then
decreasing trend with g increasing from −50 to 50 nm, where
MD achieve its maximum of 6.32 dB μm−1 and 0.94 dB μm−1
for θ = 30° and 150°, respectively.
Finally, we further discuss some other important modu-
lation characteristics of the proposed modulator with double
rectangle cross-sectional silver nanoribbons at λ = 1.55 μm.
The dependence of α on μc with different g of 0, 5 and 10 nm
is shown in Fig. 7(a). By considering the values of α and MD,
here, we select the separation g of 5 nm and assume the modu-
lator length p of 3 μm to achieve insertion loss of less than
2 dB at “ON” state and above 11 dB at “OFF” state. The simu-
lated |E| distributions along the yoz plane located at 1 nm
apart from the right edge of upper silver nanoribbon at “ON”
and “OFF” states are shown in Fig. 7(b) and (c), respectively.
For a modulator, footprint (S), 3 dB modulation bandwidth
( f3dB) and energy per bit (Ebit) also play a key role in determin-
ing the performance of modulator. Here, we define the foot-
print S as the overlap area of double graphene layers in the
modulator. The 3 dB modulation bandwidth ( f3dB) can be cal-
culated by f3dB = 1/2πRC. By assuming the proposed modulator
as an equivalent graphene–Al2O3–graphene capacitor model,
the capacitance is given by C = ε0εAl2O3S/t, where ε0 is permittiv-
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Fig. 7 The properties of the modulators with double rectangle cross-sectional silver nanoribbons at the wavelength λ = 1.55 μm. (a) Dependence of
Vg on μc and dependence of α on μc with different g of 0, 5 and 10 nm. (b) The simulated |E| distribution along the yoz plane at “ON” state. (c) The
simulated |E| distribution along the yoz plane at “OFF” state.

Table 1 A comparison of some recent reported graphene-based optical modulators at λ = 1.55 μm

Insertion loss Footprint 3 dB modulation Energy per bit

Reference MD (dB μm−1) (dB μm−1) (μm2) bandwidth (GHz) (fJ per bit)

Experimental results Liu et al.20 0.1 — 25 1.2 880

Liu et al.21 0.16 0.1 80 1 1000
Dalir et al.64 0.1 — 18 35 1400

Numerical results Kovacevic et al.24 0.28 0.05 10 30 100

Shah et al.25 0.3 0.1 80 97.26 24.3
Kim et al.26 0.42 0.05 49.2 46.4 630
This work 3.12 0.66 1.8 380.23 29.39

ity of the vacuum. Thus, the footprint (S) of 1.8 μm2 and C of
20.93 fF are obtained. As we know, the graphene sheet resis-
tance can be as low as ∼125 Ω sq−1 in a highly doped
region53,54 or as high as ∼400 kΩ sq−1 in a functionalized gra-
phene sheet with a reduction on electrical properties.55
However, owing to the tiny footprint S of this modulator, the
resistance of graphene with μc ranging from 0 to 0.65 eV can
be safely neglected. Therefore, the total series resistance R is
mainly produced by the gold-graphene contact resistance.
Because extremely low graphene/metal contact resistances
down to 20–150 Ω µm have been experimentally achieved,56–60
here, we assume the total series resistance R of
the proposed 3 μm-long device to be ∼20 Ω.53 On the
other hand, the Ebit can be calculated by Ebit = CΔV 2/4,
where ΔV is the modulation voltage between “ON” and “OFF”
state of the modulator. Since the relationship between Vg
and μc is given by Vg = enst/εrε0, where the charge
ð1
2 In this work, we have demonstrated a variety of broadband
density ns ¼ 2 2 ξ½fd ðξ; μc ; TÞ  fd ðξ þ 2μc ; μc ; TÞdξ,46 we
πℏ vF 0
obtain ΔV = Vg1(ON) − Vg2(OFF) = 2.37 V, as shown in Fig. 7(a).
In this case, the modulator demonstrates an ultra-wide 3 dB
modulation bandwidth near to 380.23 GHz and an ultra-low
energy consumption of about 29.39 fJ per bit with a very small
footprint of 1.8 μm2, which is promising for near-infrared
modulation applications. However, it is noted that the break-
down field for Al2O3 deposited with typical technologies,
atomic-layer-deposited (ALD) for example, usually ranges from
8 to 30 MV cm−1.61–63 To avoid breaking down the ultrathin
Al2O3 in practical device implement, it should be more reason-
able to assume the switching states as 0.3 and 0.5 eV for the
proposed modulator. In this case, the required ΔV and Ebit can
be drastically reduced to 0.9 V and 4.24 fJ per bit, respectively.
In addition, an even wider f3dB and lower Ebit can be obviously
anticipated by using the semicircular, rhombus or other trans-
formation cross-sectional shapes of the double silver nano-
ribbons. At last, a comparison of the performance of this
modulator and some recently reported graphene-based
modulators is summarized in Table 1.
4. Conclusion
optical waveguide modulators made up of strongly coupled
double graphene layers and double metal nanoribbons. We
have systematically studied the modulation characteristic para-
meters including attenuation constant, modulation depth,
effective mode index, normalized mode area, and carefully
investigated the effects on the chemical potential, wavelength,
separation and cross-sectional shapes of two metal nano-

Nanoscale This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2019


Nanoscale
ribbons on these parameters. It is found that due to the
unique strong HSPP coupling between double metal nano-
ribbons, the subwavelength confinement, the light-graphene
interaction and the modulation effect and the subwavelength
SPPs confinement are significantly enhanced. By optimizing
the separation, the modulator using double rectangle metal
nanoribbon with a high MD of 3.12 dB μm−1, a small footprint
of 1.8 μm2, an ultra-wide 3 dB modulation bandwidth of
380.23 GHz, and an ultra-low energy consumption of 29.39
fJ per bit at 1.55 μm can be achieved. Furthermore, the modu-
Published on 29 January 2019. Downloaded by Temple University on 2/4/2019 12:37:10 AM.
lation performance of the modulator can be greatly enhanced
by using the metal nanoribbons with sharp wedge tips. We
also demonstrate the modulators using properly apart semicir-
cular and rhombus metal nanoribbons with drastically
enhanced MDs of 11.3 and 6.32 dB μm−1 at 1.55 μm, respect-
ively. The proposed broadband modulators process strong sub-
wavelength confinement and excellent broadband modulation
performance, which are greatly superior to the reported con-
ventional graphene-based modulators. This study may provide
a reference for the development of efficient broadband gra-
phene-based electro-absorptive and electro-refractive modu-
lators, which can be engineered for various highly integrated
interconnects and optoelectronic devices.
Conflicts of interest
There are no conflicts to declare.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the National Natural Science
Foundation of China (61601393).
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