ISSN 00213640, JETP Letters, 2013, Vol. 97, No. 9, pp. 535539. Pleiades Publishing, Inc., 2013.

Original Russian Text P.I. Buslaev, I.V. Iorsh, I.V. Shadrivov, P.A. Belov, Yu.S. Kivshar, 2013, published in Pisma v Zhurnal Eksperimentalnoi i Teoreticheskoi Fiziki, 2013,
Vol. 97, No. 9, pp. 619623.
535
Much attention has been attracted in recent years to
graphene, a material made up of a twodimensional lat
tice of carbon atoms [14]. From the fundamental
point of view, graphene is interesting because charge
carriers in this material are characterized by a linear dis
persion relation, which leads to such phenomena as the
roomtemperature quantum Hall effect [5] and the
existence of a nonzero Berry phase for charge carriers
[2]. Graphene is also promising for applications owing
to the high chargecarrier mobility, which is required for
the new generation of electronic integrated circuits [6].
In the last few years, the interaction of graphene
with an electromagnetic field has become actively
studied. It was predicted that TE and TMpolarized
localized surface waves can propagate along a
graphene surface, the dispersion of these waves falling
in the terahertz frequency range [7]. A concept for
implementing twodimensional optical integrated cir
cuits based on graphene was proposed in [8]. An
important property of surface waves in graphene is the
possibility to efficiently control their propagation and
dispersion characteristics by changing the gate voltage
or the magnetic field oriented perpendicularly to the
graphene plane [9, 10].
Recently, it was demonstrated that an optical mod
ulator can be made on the basis of a waveguide system
formed by two graphene layers [11]. Absorption in sys
tems of this kind was considered in [12]. The possibil
ities of controlling the dispersion of waveguide modes
by the magnetic field, gate voltage, or temperature
were examined in [9, 13]. However, only the disper
sion properties of TMpolarized surface waves, similar
to guided modes in metal/insulator plasmonic
waveguides, were investigated in these studies.
Here, we demonstrate that a system of two
graphene layers spaced by a dielectric layer with the
thickness d and relative permittivity ] (Fig. 1) sup
ports both TE and TMpolarized waveguide modes.
The ranges of existence of TEpolarized modes are
investigated. The characteristics of guided modes in
the system under study are compared with those in
metal/insulator plasmonic waveguides.
In order to determine the spectrum of propagating
guided modes localized in the vicinity of the two
dimensional layer, we write the boundary conditions
for the tangential components of the electric and mag
netic fields:
(1)
(2)
where n
12
is the unit vector along the normal oriented
from region 1 to region 2 and E
||
is the electric field of
the wave in the xz plane, which induces current in the
graphene layers.
E
1
E
2
( ) n
12
0, =
H
1
H
2
( ) n
12

4
c
T , , , ( )E
||
, =
Plasmons in Waveguide Structures Formed
by Two Graphene Layers
P. I. Buslaev
a
, I. V. Iorsh
a
, I. V. Shadrivov
a, b
, P. A. Belov
a
, and Yu. S. Kivshar
b
a
National Research University of Information Technologies, Mechanics, and Optics, St. Petersburg, 197101 Russia
email: p.buslaev@phoi.ifmo.ru
b
Nonlinear Physics Center, Research School of Physics and Engineering, Australian National University,
ACT 0200 Canberra, Australia
Received March 20, 2013; in final form, April 9, 2013
Plasmon modes in a waveguide formed by two parallel graphene layers with an insulator spacer layer are con
sidered. The existence of TM and TE guided modes is predicted and their properties are compared with those
of plasmons in metal/insulator waveguides.
DOI: 10.1134/S0021364013090063
Fig. 1. Waveguide structure formed by two parallel
graphene layers separated by a dielectric layer with the
thickness d and dielectric constant .
536
JETP LETTERS Vol. 97 No. 9 2013
BUSLAEV et al.
Writing the equations that describe propagating
plane waves (see Fig. 2) and applying boundary condi
tions (1), (2) for the waveguide consisting of two
graphene layers, we obtain the equations for TM
polarized waves
(3)
and TEpolarized waves
(4)
Setting the determinant of the matrices in Eqs. (3) and
(4) equal to zero, we obtain the dispersion relations for
electric and magnetic surface waves:
(5)
(6)
1 1 e
q' d
0
i
4
c

q
k
0
1 +
q
q'

q
q'
e
q' d
0
0
q
q'
e
q' d

q
q'
i
4
c

q
k
0
1 +
0 e
q' d
1 1 \ .
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|

E
1
E
2
+
E
2

E
3
\ .
|
|
|
|
|
|
0, =
1
q
q'

q
q'
e
q' d
0
i
4
c

k
0
q
1 1 e
q' d
0
0 e
q' d
1 i
4
c

k
0
q
1
0
q
q'
e
q' d

q
q'
1
\ .
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|

H
1
H
2
+
H
2

H
3
\ .
|
|
|
|
|
|
0. =
1 i
4
c

q
k
0
( ) +
q
q'

e
q' d
1 +
e
q' d
1
for TM
1
, =
1 i
4
c

q
k
0
( ) +
q
q'

e
q' d
1
e
q' d
1 +
for TM
2
, =

i
4
c

k
0
q
( ) 1
q'
q

e
q' d
1
e
q' d
1 +
for TE
1
, =
i
4
c

k
0
q
( ) 1
q'
q

e
q' d
1 +
e
q' d
1
for TE
2
. =

Here, k
0
= /c, c is the speed of light, q = ,
q' = , and = k
z
is the magnitude of the wave
vector component along the propagation direction.
The graphene conductivity was calculated under
various assumptions in [1417]. We use the results
obtained in [16], since losses in graphene were taken
into account in that paper:
(7)
where
e is the elementary charge, is the Planck constant, k
B
is the Boltzmann constant, is the frequency of the
wave, is the decay constant, is the electron energy,
is the chemical potential, and T is the temperature.
The conductivity calculated according to Eq. (7) is
plotted in Fig. 3. One can see that, for certain frequen
cies, the imaginary part of the conductivity becomes
negative. This means that, for these frequencies, TE
polarized surface waves can propagate along a single
graphene layer [7]. For other frequencies, only TM
polarized surface waves can propagate in singlelayer
graphene. In this context, it is reasonable to suggest
that waveguide systems formed by two graphene layers
can also support both TE and TMpolarized propa
gating waves at certain frequencies.
Figure 4 shows the profiles of the waveguide modes.
One can see that mode TM
1
is antisymmetric and
mode TM
2
is symmetric. In addition, there is only one
antisymmetric TE
1
mode in the TE polarization. The
localization of this mode is weak.
Figures 5 and 6 show the dispersion curves for the
two TM modes and the TE mode, respectively.
According to these figures, both TE and TMpolar
ized plasmon modes exist in the terahertz frequency
range. Note that the TE
1
mode has almost linear dis
persion and small losses. This is a consequence of the
small degree of localization of this mode and indicates
that it is nearly equivalent to a plane wave propagating
in free space.
In contrast, TMpolarized modes are strongly
localized and, as a consequence, are characterized by
small propagation lengths and strong dispersion,
which differs markedly from that of a plane electro

2
k
0
2

2
k
0
2

T , , , ( )
ie
2
i 2 + ( )

2
=

1
i 2 + ( )
2

f
d
( )

f
d
( )

d
0

f
d
( ) f
d
( )
i 2 + ( )
2
4 / ( )
2

d
0

)
`

,
f
d
( )

k
B
T

\ .
|
exp 1 +
1
, =
JETP LETTERS Vol. 97 No. 9 2013
PLASMONS IN WAVEGUIDE STRUCTURES 537
magnetic wave in free space. The dispersion curve in
Fig. 5a has a region of negative group velocity. It
should be noted, however, that this region is also char
acterized by high losses, so that the imaginary part of
the waveguide number becomes comparable to or
larger than its real part.
The absence of the symmetric TE
2
mode in this
system needs an additional discussion. It can easily be
shown that the relationship q 0 is always satisfied for
a TEpolarized mode. Analyzing the dispersion rela
tion for the mode TE
2
in the absence of losses, we
obtain the following condition for the existence of this
mode:
(8)
which is satisfied for d > 10
4
cm. When losses are
taken into account, the minimum spacing between the
graphene layers required for the existence of the TE
2
mode increases further.
Obviously, the waveguide description given above is
valid if the linear dimensions of the system along the
direction of propagation are much larger than the
transverse dimensions. Currently, the linear sizes of
highquality graphene films obtained experimentally
do not exceed a few microns. Thus, at present, the
implementation of a waveguide system supporting a
symmetric TEpolarized mode seems unfeasible.
In addition to the spacing between the layers, the
existence of TEpolarized modes depends also on the
dielectric constants
1
and
2
of the medium outside
the waveguide system and the insulator separating the
graphene single layers, respectively. As was mentioned
above, q 0 for TE modes. In the system under study,
d = 10
6
cm and k
0
10
4
cm
1
. If we use the approxi
mation e
q'd
1 + q'd on the righthand sides of the dis
persion relations, then, discarding terms of the second
4
''
c

1 k
0
d
2
, cot <
order, we can easily obtain an approximate solution to
the equation q = :
(9)
The analysis of these expressions indicates that mode
TE
1
can exist if
1
/
2
< 0.4, while the numerical calcu

1
k
0
2

q

2

1
( )
1
2
2
dk
0
2
i
4
c
k
0

1
for TE
1
, + =
q i
4
c
k
0

1
2
d

2
for TE
2
. =

Fig. 2. Waveguide system consisting of two graphene layers

with a dielectric layer ( =
s
) between them; E
1
, , ,
and E
3
and H
1
, , , and H
3
are the components of
the electric and magnetic field, respectively, along the
propagation direction in the corresponding spatial regions;
d is the separation between the graphene layers; and q' and
q are introduced in the text following Eqs. (3), (4).
E
2
+
E
2

H
2
+
H
2

Fig. 3. Conductivity of a graphene layer in units of

0
=
e
2
/(2h) versus the frequency for = 1 meV, T = 300 K,
and = 0.2 eV.
Fig. 4. Field distribution profiles for the waveguide modes
calculated for T = 300 K, = 0.2 eV,
s
= 4, d = 10
6
cm,
= 1 meV, and frequency / = 0.9 (TM modes) and 1.9
(TE mode). (a) TM modes are characterized by the real
part of the tangential electricfield component. (b) TE
mode is characterized by the real part of the tangential
magneticfield component.
538
JETP LETTERS Vol. 97 No. 9 2013
BUSLAEV et al.
lation yields an estimate
1
/
2
< 0.77. For mode TE
2
,
the solution does not satisfy the condition q 0; this
fact gives additional indirect evidence of the absence
of this mode.
Metal/insulator plasmonic waveguides support the
propagation of coupled surface plasmons similar to
those in the waveguide system with two graphene lay
ers considered above. For the sake of comparison, let
us consider two different threelayer systems, i.e.,
metal/insulator/metal and insulator/metal/insulator
ones. The dielectric function of a metal is given by the
Drude formula
(10)
It should be noted that only TMpolarized surface
waves exist in metal/insulator structures. The disper
sion relation for these systems can be obtained in the
following form:
. (11)

m
( )

p
2
i + ( )
. =

i
q
j

j
q
i

i
q
j

j
q
i
+
e
q
i
d
1 =
Here, i, j {1, 2};
i
is the dielectric function of the
corresponding layer; q
i
= ; and k
0
were
introduced above; and d is the thickness of the middle
layer.
Comparing different types of surface waves, let us
consider the following parameters: (Im)
1
, which
characterizes the plasmon propagation length, and
(Req)
1
, which describes plasmon localization. The
characteristics of different structures are given in the
table.
The table lists the parameters of a waveguide system
formed by two graphene layers and of two metal/insu
lator multilayer structures (metal/insulator/metal and
insulator/metal/insulator ones). Furthermore, the
characteristics of the graphenebased waveguide sys
tem are compared for low and high frequencies. At low
frequencies, the plasmon propagation length (Im)
1
in the system with graphene layers is somewhat larger
than that in metal/insulator structures. At high fre
quencies, where the imaginary part of increases by
several orders of magnitude (see Fig. 5b), plasmons
hardly propagate. The plasmon localization length

i
k
0
2

Fig. 5. Dispersion curves for TMpolarized localized

modes calculated for = 0.2 eV, T = 300 K, d = 10
6
cm,
and = 1 meV: (a) Re() and (b) Im() versus frequency.
Fig. 6. Dispersion curves for TEpolarized localized
modes calculated for = 0.2 eV, T = 300 K, d = 10
6
cm,
and = 1 meV: (a) Re() and (b) Im() versus frequency.
JETP LETTERS Vol. 97 No. 9 2013
PLASMONS IN WAVEGUIDE STRUCTURES 539
(Req)
1
is nearly the same for graphenebased and
metal/insulator structures; however, at low frequen
cies, plasmons are more strongly localized in the sys
tem with graphene layers than in metal/insulator
structures. Thus, at low frequencies, the characteris
tics of the system formed by two graphene layers are
somewhat better than those of metal/insulator struc
tures.
We also calculated the dependences of the propaga
tion and decay constants of the TM
1
mode on the
chemical potential in graphene in the vicinity of the
Dirac point. These dependences calculated for a fre
quency of 0.1 eV are shown in Fig. 7. One can see that
the guided modes of the structure are symmetric with
respect to the Dirac point. Upon approaching the
bandtoband absorption threshold (/ = 0.5), both
the degree of localization of the surface wave Re and
the mode decay constant Im increase. Nevertheless,
there exists a region where the wave is strongly local
ized and losses are still fairly low.
Thus, we have obtained the dispersion relations for
plasmonic modes in a waveguide system formed by two
graphene layers separated by a layer of insulator. We
have demonstrated that TE and TMpolarized plas
mon modes exist in such a system in the terahertz fre
quency range. The group velocity of these waves has
been analyzed and the possibility of the existence of
guided modes with negative group velocity has been
shown. The characteristics of guided modes in the sys
tem with two graphene layers have been compared to
those of plasmon modes in metal/insulator nanostruc
tures.
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Translated by M. Skorikov
Fig. 7. Propagation and decay constants of mode TM
1
ver
sus the chemical potential in the vicinity of the Dirac
point.
Plasmon parameters in different structures*
DLG lf DLG hf IMI MIM
Propagation length 10
1
10
2
10
3
10
2
10
0
10
2
10
0
10
2
Degree of localization 10
1
10
3
~10
1
10
2
10
4
~10
1
* The propagation length and degree of localization are given in units of plasmon wavelength and layer spacing d, respectively. DLG
stands for the waveguide system with two graphene layers; its parameters are calculated for low frequencies (lf), corresponding to
the lower parts ( < 0.2 eV) of the curves in Fig. 5b, and high frequencies (hf), corresponding to the upper parts ( > 0.2 eV) of
the curves in Fig. 5b. MIM and IMI stand for metal/insulator/metal and insulator/metal/insulator structures, respectively.