Enhanced optical chirality with directional emission of Surface Plasmon Polaritons for chiral sensing applications
Abstract
Chirality is a crucial aspect in life sciences, where systems capable of enhancing the chiroptical properties of molecules are highly demanded. In this work, we present a numerical proof of concept of a novel approach towards chiral sensing, consisting in the measurement of chiroptical properties via the directional emission of Surface Plasmon Polaritons (SPPs) on a metasurface. Based on the enhanced differential absorption between right and left circularly polarized light upon interaction with a metasurface made of high refractive index dielectric unit cells, a polarization-dependent SPP differential emission is obtained. Furthermore, the plasmonic emission direction is entirely dependent on the polarization handedness. Using FDTD numerical methods we report Circular Dichroism signals of around − 6° for the unit cell, with threefold dissymmetry factor enhancements in places accessible to analytes. We believe that this work sets a brand-new branch in chiral sensing towards faster, real-time measurements.
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BibTeX
@article{serrera2026enhanced,
title = {{Enhanced optical chirality with directional emission of Surface Plasmon Polaritons for chiral sensing applications}},
author = {Guillermo Serrera and Javier González-Colsa and Vincenzo Giannini and José Saiz and Pablo Albella},
journal = {Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.1016/j.jqsrt.2022.108166},
url = {https://hal.science/hal-05796097v1},
note = {CC BY-NC-ND},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Enhanced optical chirality with directional emission of Surface Plasmon Polaritons for chiral sensing applications
AU - Guillermo Serrera
AU - Javier González-Colsa
AU - Vincenzo Giannini
AU - José Saiz
AU - Pablo Albella
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/12
JO - Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer
DO - 10.1016/j.jqsrt.2022.108166
UR - https://hal.science/hal-05796097v1
AB - Chirality is a crucial aspect in life sciences, where systems capable of enhancing the chiroptical properties of molecules are highly demanded. In this work, we present a numerical proof of concept of a novel approach towards chiral sensing, consisting in the measurement of chiroptical properties via the directional emission of Surface Plasmon Polaritons (SPPs) on a metasurface. Based on the enhanced differential absorption between right and left circularly polarized light upon interaction with a metasurface made of high refractive index dielectric unit cells, a polarization-dependent SPP differential emission is obtained. Furthermore, the plasmonic emission direction is entirely dependent on the polarization handedness. Using FDTD numerical methods we report Circular Dichroism signals of around − 6° for the unit cell, with threefold dissymmetry factor enhancements in places accessible to analytes. We believe that this work sets a brand-new branch in chiral sensing towards faster, real-time measurements.
SN - 0022-4073
SN - 1879-1352
ER -