Terahertz optical bistability of graphene in thin layers of dielectrics

We theoretically studied in terahertz frequency regime optical bistability of graphene placed at the interface between thin dielectric layers. We solved self-consistently the nonlinear wave equations containing the third-order optical conductivity of graphene in four-layer structures and obtained hysteresis response of the transmitted power as a function of the incident power. We numerically observed that the critical powers for the up and down transitions and the Fermi-energy of graphene required for terahertz optical bistability can be reduced by carefully choosing material properties and the thicknesses of dielectric layers. Furthermore, these values can be substantially decreased when graphene as a randomly stacked multilayer structure is asymmetrically located in thin dielectric layers. (C) 2017 Optical Society of America