Effect of strain on surface plasmon polaritons of a graphene cladded one-dimensional photonic crystal

We investigate the dispersion properties of TE-polarized surface plasmon polaritons at the interface of a strained graphene cladded one-dimensional photonic crystal and a homogeneous medium. The optical conductivity of graphene under uniform planar tension is numerically calculated using the perturbation theory and the nearest-neighbor tight-binding approximation. We show that the wavelength, propagation length, and penetration depth of the surface plasmon polaritons in the homogeneous environment and the photonic crystal depend on the magnitude and orientation of the applied strain. Depending on the magnitude and direction of the tension, a Van Hove singularity may appear at the electronic band structure of the graphene in the desired frequency interval. We show that the surface mode corresponding to the Van Hove singularity has the least propagation length. We also observe that strain only affects the penetration depth of the low-frequency surface plasmon polaritons in the homogeneous medium and the high-frequency surface plasmon polaritons in the photonic crystal. (C) 2020 Optical Society of America