Surface plasmons amplifications in single Ag nanoring

The stimulated amplifications of surface plasmons (SPs) propagating along a single silver nanoring is theoretically investigated by considering the interactions between SPs and activated semiconductor quantum dots (SQDs). Threshold condition for the stimulated amplifications, the SP density as a function of propagation length and the maximum SP density are obtained. The SPs can be nonlinearly amplified when the pumping rate of SQDs is larger than the threshold, and the maximum value of SP density increases linearly with the pumping rate of SQDs. (C) 2010 Optical Society of America