Strong coupling of hybrid and plasmonic resonances in liquid core plasmonic micro-bubble cavities

A thin-wall plasmonic micro-bubble resonator, which is a high-Q optofluidic silica bubble cavity with a thin Ag film on the inside wall of the bubble, is proposed and fabricated to manipulate coupling among various types of resonant modes by changing its wall thickness and refractive index of the liquid in the core. Coupling of high-Q whispering gallery mode/plasmonic resonant mode forms hybridmode; the hybrid mode can again strongly couple with another interior plasmonic resonant mode in the bubble cavity to achieve tunable high-Q plasmonic resonance that can be feasibly accessed by standard tapered fiber coupling. Therefore, the novel cavity structure provides a unique, yet general, platform to study plasmonic/photonic, hybrid/plasmonic, and plasmonic/plasmonic coupling. (C) 2015 Optical Society of America