An all-optical plasmonic limiter based on a nonlinear slow light waveguide.

An all-optical plasmonic limiter based on a nonlinear slow light waveguide is proposed and numerically investigated for the first time. The results reveal that the slowdown factor can be tuned by the intensities of incident surface plasmon waves. In addition, the nonlinear slow light waveguide can be operated as a limiter, in which surface plasmon waves with low incident power intensities can transmit through the limiter while those with high power are completely blocked. The proposed structure has many advantages; it supports sub-wavelength broadband slow light guide modes, it is compatible with semiconductor devices and it has an ultra-fast response time at a femtosecond scale, which are promising for all-optical integrated plasmonic devices.