Surfaces, films, and multilayers for compact nonlinear plasmonics

We present a step-by-step analysis of four-wave mixing (FWM) in one-dimensional stacks of metallo-dielectric structures, pointing out various channels of plasmonic and Fabry-Perot enhancement. We start from the derivation of oblique incidence FWM at a single interface and then extend these expressions into a transfer-matrix-based formalism to quantitatively study films and multilayer geometries. Throughout our analysis, we consider typical examples, such as a single silver interface, a thin silver film, and Fabry-Perot multilayers. In this way, we offer an intuitive view of the surprisingly rich dynamics supported by even the simplest of nonlinear plasmonic systems. © 2013 Optical Society of America.