Nathaniel Kinsey

Nathaniel Kinsey
Virginia Commonwealth University | VCU · Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

Doctor of Philosophy
Photonics and Energy

About

143
Publications
37,468
Reads
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4,618
Citations
Introduction
Nathaniel Kinsey currently works at Virginia Commonwealth University in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Nathaniel performs research in Nonlinear Optics, Nanophotonics, Materials Physics, Solid State Physics.
Additional affiliations
July 2012 - August 2016
Purdue University West Lafayette
Position
  • PhD Student
Description
  • Investigating the nonlinear optical properties of alternative plasmonic films Design, fabricate, and test integrated plasmonic devices using alternative plasmonic materials
May 2011 - July 2012
University of Missouri
Position
  • Master's Student
Description
  • Studied and designed solid state optical switches for RF signals using gallium nitride.
Education
July 2012 - July 2016
Purdue University West Lafayette
Field of study
  • Electrical Engineering
May 2011 - July 2012
University of Missouri
Field of study
  • Electrical Engineering
August 2007 - May 2011
University of Missouri
Field of study
  • Electrical Engineering

Publications

Publications (143)
Article
Full-text available
The conversion of a photon’s frequency has long been a key application area of nonlinear optics. It has been discussed how a slow temporal variation of a material’s refractive index can lead to the adiabatic frequency shift (AFS) of a pulse spectrum. Such a rigid spectral change has relevant technological implications, for example, in ultrafast sig...
Article
Full-text available
For decades, nonlinear optics has been used to control the frequency and propagation of light in unique ways enabling a wide range of applications such as ultrafast lasing, sub-wavelength imaging, and novel sensing methods. Through this, a key thread of research in the field has always been the development of new and improved nonlinear materials to...
Article
Full-text available
Major technological breakthroughs are often driven by advancements in materials research, and optics is no different. Over the last few years, near-zero-index (NZI) materials have triggered significant interest owing to their exceptional tunability of optical properties and enhanced light-matter interaction, leading to several demonstrations of com...
Article
Full-text available
Novel materials, with enhanced light–matter interaction capabilities, play an essential role in achieving the lofty goals of nonlinear optics. Recently, epsilon‐near‐zero (ENZ) media have emerged as a promising candidate to enable the enhancement of several nonlinear processes including refractive index modulation and harmonic generation. Here, the...
Method
Full-text available
The nonlinear epsilon-near-zero calculator (NLENZ) is a versatile tool that can calculate the nonlinear response of a free-carrier driven material for both IR and UV excitation conditions. Using fundamental band structures of materials such as ITO, XX:ZnO, XX:CdO, and XX:GaN, the nonlinear change in refractive index (or permittivity) can be calcula...
Article
Epsilon‐near‐zero (ENZ) materials have shown strong refractive nonlinearities that can be fast in an absolute sense. While continuing to advance fundamental science, such as time varying interactions, the community is still searching for an application that can effectively make use of the strong index modulation offered. Here, the effect of strong...
Article
Full-text available
We address challenges in characterizing changes in permittivity and refractive index beyond standard perturbative methods with special attention given to transparent conductive oxides (TCOs). We unveil a realistic limit to permittivity changes under high optical power densities. Our study covers both slow and ultrafast nonlinearities, demonstrating...
Preprint
Full-text available
Epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) materials have shown strong refractive nonlinearities that can be fast in an absolute sense. While continuing to advance fundamental science, such as time varying interactions, the community is still searching for an application that can effectively make use of the strong index modulation offered. Here we combine the effect...
Article
Full-text available
Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) stands as the primary cause of liver cancers, with limited treatment options outside of surgical resection or transplant. Photodynamic therapy (PDT) using indocyanine green (ICG) as a photosensitizer offers a promising therapeutic option for HCC. ICG PDT has demonstrated efficacy in vitro and in vivo, providing a safe...
Article
Full-text available
In the continuously evolving realm of nonlinear optics, epsilon near zero (ENZ) materials have captured significant scientific interest, becoming a compelling focal point over the past decade. During this time, researchers have shown extraordinary demonstrations of nonlinear processes such as unity order index change via intensity dependent refract...
Conference Paper
Using the nonlinear optical characterization technique beam deflection, we utilize an off-axis excitation scheme in order to characterize input pulses for their temporal and spatial widths, angle, and relative offset with femtosecond and micron resolution.
Article
Full-text available
The engineering of the spatial and temporal properties of both the electric permittivity and the refractive index of materials is at the core of photonics. When vanishing to zero, those two variables provide efficient knobs to control light−matter interactions. This Perspective aims at providing an overview of the state of the art and the challenge...
Article
This article contains an update to Fig. 2 of the original manuscript entitled "Near-zero-index materials for photonics", 4, pages 742–760 (2019)Nature Reviews Materials, 2019.
Preprint
Full-text available
The engineering of the spatial and temporal properties of both the electric permittivity and the refractive index of materials is at the core of photonics. When vanishing to zero, those two variables provide new knobs to control light-matter interactions. This perspective aims at providing an overview of the state of the art and the challenges in e...
Article
Full-text available
In its 60 years of existence, the field of nonlinear optics has gained momentum especially over the past two decades thanks to major breakthroughs in material science and technology. In this article, we present a new set of data tables listing nonlinear-optical properties for different material categories as reported in the literature since 2000. T...
Article
Full-text available
Strong nonlinear materials have been sought after for decades for applications in telecommunications, sensing, and quantum optics. Gallium-doped zinc oxide is a II-VI transparent conducting oxide that shows promising nonlinearities similar to indium tin oxide and aluminum-doped zinc oxide for the telecommunications band. Here we explore its nonline...
Preprint
Full-text available
In its 60 years of existence, the field of nonlinear optics has gained momentum especially over the past two decades thanks to major breakthroughs in material science and technology. In this article, we present a new set of data tables listing nonlinear-optical properties for different material categories as reported in the literature since 2000. T...
Conference Paper
On the occasion of 60 years of nonlinear-optical research, we present new data tables listing nonlinear- optical properties for different material categories as reported in the literature since 2000, and provide best practices for performing experiments.
Article
Full-text available
To address the challenges of developing a scalable system of an on-chip integrated quantum emitter, we propose to leverage the loss in our hybrid plasmonic-photonic structure to simultaneously achieve Purcell enhancement as well as on-chip maneuvering of nanoscale emitter via optical trapping with guided excitation-emission routes. In this report,...
Preprint
Full-text available
Strong nonlinear materials have been sought after for decades for applications in telecommunications, sensing, and quantum optics. Gallium-doped zinc oxide is a II-VI transparent conducting oxide that shows promising nonlinearities similar to indium tin oxide and aluminum-doped zinc oxide for the telecommunications band. Here we explore its nonline...
Article
Full-text available
This is an introduction to the feature issue of Optical Materials Express on Oxide Materials for Emerging Applications in Photonics.
Presentation
Epsilon-near-zero materials are a rapidly expanding field due to their enhanced light matter interaction. These materials have shown large changes in refractive index on the order of the linear index; however, this is associated with large absorption changes. Here we experimentally and theoretically show a method to mitigate the absorption changes...
Article
Full-text available
Plasmonic-based integrated nanophotonic modulators, despite their promising features, have one key limiting factor of large insertion loss (IL), which limits their practical potential. To combat this, we utilize a plasmon-assisted approach through the lens of surface-to-volume ratio to realize a 4-slot based EAM with an extinction ratio (ER) of 2.6...
Article
Full-text available
Refractive index invariably describes the speed at which light passes through materials, and subsequently its perceived momentum. But what happens to these quantities as the index becomes zero? A new work explores this question, highlighting how momentum in near-zero-index materials affects linear optical processes.
Article
Full-text available
In nonlinear optics, significant effort is concentrated on improving the strength and efficiency of interactions; however, experimentally investigating nonlinear materials is a complex, time-consuming, and costly investment. Moreover, it is often challenging to isolate, study, and optimize material parameters in an experiment due to complexities in...
Article
Full-text available
In its 60 years of existence, the field of nonlinear optics has gained momentum especially over the past two decades thanks to major breakthroughs in material science and technology. In this article, we present a new set of data tables listing nonlinear-optical properties for different material categories as reported in the literature since 2000. T...
Conference Paper
We numerically investigate the temporal dynamics of radiation within an epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) film in conditions where the ENZ mode is strongly coupled to the plasmonic resonances of gold nanoantennae patterned on the ENZ film.
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) materials have demonstrated enhanced nonlinear optical interactions and efforts to push performance are underway. Beginning with the origin of nonlinearities in ENZ, we highlight avenues for improvement using nanostructures and tailored illumination.
Article
Subwavelength epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) films with decorated nanoantennae are an emerging platform for coupling radiation into the ENZ mode: recent experiments have shown how strong coupling between the two systems underpins significant nonlinear effects. Field enhancement and the temporal dynamic of the radiation in ENZ films strongly coupled with p...
Article
Electromagnetic radiation when coupled to collective oscillations of free electrons, dubbed as plasmonics, makes it possible to manipulate light at dimensions well below the diffraction limit and substantially enhances light–matter interaction. Plasmonics has already enabled many novel technologies with a wide variety of application in chemical and...
Article
Full-text available
A mechanically robust metasurface exhibiting plasmonic colors across the visible and the near-IR spectrum is designed, fabricated, and characterized. Thin TiN layers (41 nm in thickness) prepared by plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition (ALD) are patterned with sub-wavelength apertures (75 nm to 150 nm radii), arranged with hexagonal periodicity....
Article
Full-text available
Titanium nitride (TiN) is a highly sought‐after material for plasmonics and nanophotonics applications owing to its gold‐like but tunable optical properties. Its prodigious potential in plasmonic devices has been demonstrated on sapphire or bulk MgO substrates. For a transformational impact, high optical quality TiN on Si is required instead, which...
Data
Raw data from D. Fomra et al "Al:ZnO as a platform for near-zero-index photonics: enhancing the doping efficiency of atomic layer deposition" Opt. Mater. Express 10(12), 2020.
Conference Paper
We report a plasmon-driven thermomechanical switch, which is actuated using the ohmic losses of plasmons as a highly concentrated and thermally isolated heat source. This device operates with sub-15ns switching time and sub-10mW power consumption.
Conference Paper
We demonstrate an on-chip hybrid plasmonic-waveguide based trapping system to combine electro-thermo-plasmonic flow and negative thermophoretic force with optical gradient force in realizing stable (8 KBT) and fast (within seconds) trapping of sub-nm particles (10 nm).
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Increasing the ratio of ENZ surface area to device volume containing TCO material exhibits improved performance for the ENZ-based Electro-absorption Modulator in terms of the ratio of Extinction Ratio and Insertion Loss.
Conference Paper
We investigate the Purcell enhancement (>500x) and collection efficiency (10%) achievable for an emitter trapped in a hybrid-plasmonic-waveguide based tweezer with the prospect of realizing a compact, on-chip platform for single-photon generation.
Preprint
Full-text available
Novel materials, with enhanced light-matter interaction capabilities, play an essential role in achieving the lofty goals of nonlinear optics. Recently, Epsilon-Near-Zero (ENZ) media have emerged as a promising candidate to enable the enhancement of several nonlinear processes including refractive index modulation and harmonic generation. Here, we...
Data
Raw data from D. Fomra et al "Plasmonic titanium nitride via atomic layer deposition: a low-temperature route" J. Appl. Phys. 127(10), 2020.
Preprint
Full-text available
For decades, nonlinear optics has been used to control the frequency and propagation of light in unique ways enabling a wide range of applications such as ultrafast lasing, sub-wavelength imaging, and novel sensing methods. Through this, a key thread of research in the field has always been the development of new and improved nonlinear materials to...
Article
Full-text available
To integrate plasmonic devices into industry, it is essential to develop scalable and CMOS compatible plasmonic materials. In this work, we report high plasmonic quality titanium nitride (TiN) on c-plane sapphire grown by plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition. TiN with low losses, high metallicity, and a plasma frequency below 500 nm was achieved...
Preprint
Full-text available
To integrate plasmonic devices into industry, it is essential to develop scalable and CMOS compatible plasmonic materials. In this work, we report high plasmonic quality titanium nitride (TiN) on c-plane sapphire by plasma enhanced atomic layer deposition (PE-ALD). TiN with low losses and high metallicity was achieved at temperatures below 500{\deg...
Article
Full-text available
The discovery, design and development of materials are critically linked to advances in many areas of research, and optics is no exception. Recently, the spectral region in which the index of refraction of a material approaches zero has become a topic of interest owing to fascinating phenomena, such as static light, enhanced nonlinearities, light t...
Article
Full-text available
Titanium nitride is widely used in plasmonic applications, due to its robustness and optical properties which resemble those of gold. Despite this interest, the nonlinear properties have only recently begun to be investigated. In this work, beam deflection and non-degenerate femtosecond pump-probe spectroscopy (800 nm pump and 650 nm probe) were us...
Article
Full-text available
We investigate adiabatic frequency conversion using epsilon near zero (ENZ) materials and show that while the maximum frequency conversion for a given change of permittivity does not exhibit increase in the vicinity of epsilon=0 condition. However, that change can be achieved in a shorter length, and if the pump is also in the ENZ vicinity, at a lo...
Preprint
Full-text available
We investigate adiabatic frequency conversion using epsilon near zero (ENZ) materials and show that while the maximum frequency conversion for a given change of permittivity does not exhibit increase in the vicinity of {\epsilon}=0 condition. However, that change can be achieved in a shorter length, and if the pump is also in the ENZ vicinity, at a...
Article
Full-text available
Epsilon-near-zero materials have recently come onto the scene as promising new nonlinear optical materials. However, this field is quite crowded and it is prudent to ask whether they possess any key features which will elevate them above other candidates. It is our opinion that they in fact possess two such features, a simultaneous intrinsic and ex...
Article
Full-text available
Spectroscopic ellipsometry is a prominent method for finding both the thickness and permittivity of unknown thin material films due to its sensitivity, flexibility, and self-referencing nature. For non-absorbing films, the thickness and permittivity can be readily retrieved due to an excess of data content, which produces a clearly defined best-fit...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
To optimize the excitation and predict behavior of nonlinear interactions in near-zero-index media, physically accurate models are needed. We describe a phenomenological model that can extract standard coefficients and optical excitation conditions.
Conference Paper
We demonstrate high plasmonic quality TiN on Si (001) via PE-ALD. Employment of an MgO buffer improved the figure of merit (FoM) at 1550 nm from 2.0 to 2.5 and the peak FoM from 2.4 to 2.8.
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Patterned titanium nitride films grown via PE-ALD exhibit plasmonic colors along with being scratch resistant and durable making them an attractive choice for applications that require robust materials such as security holograms and labels.
Article
Full-text available
A solid-state hybrid photonic-plasmonic (HPP) waveguide geometry has been experimentally demonstrated with plasmonic titanium nitride. The configuration is made with robust fabrication techniques, CMOS-compatible materials, and features a straightforward design with dielectric cladding layers that exhibit a significant index mismatch with the subst...