Solid state illumination device having plasmonic antenna array for anisotropic emission

1. An illumination device, comprising:

a photon emitter configured to emit photons of a wavelength; and

a periodic plasmonic antenna array comprising a plurality of individual antenna elements arranged in an antenna array plane, wherein:

said plasmonic antenna array is arranged in close proximity of said photon emitter such that at least a portion of said photons are emitted by a coupled system comprising said photon emitter and said plasmonic antenna array;

said individual antenna elements are out-of-plane asymmetric and have a height such that a ratio between the height of the antenna elements and the wavelength is in the range of 0.143 to 0.385; and

said plasmonic antenna array is configured to:

support surface lattice resonances at the wavelength, arising from diffractive coupling of localized surface plasmon resonances in said individual antenna elements; and

comprise plasmon resonance modes being out-of-plane asymmetric, such that light emitted from said plasmonic antenna array has an anisotropic angle distribution in relation to said antenna array plane.

2. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein said photon emitter is arranged at a distance from said plasmonic antenna array such that a majority of the emitted photons are emitted by the coupled system comprising said photon emitter and said plasmonic antenna array.

3. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein said photon emitter is a point emitter capable of being excited by an external energy source, said point emitter being selected from the group comprising rare earth ions, dye molecules quantum dots and metal clusters.

4. The illumination device according to claim 3 , further comprising an external energy source in the form of a photon emitter, an electron emitter, an x-ray emitter or a gamma-ray emitter or an electron-hole pair.

5. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein said photon emitter is a light emitting diode or a solid state laser.

6. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein said plasmonic antenna array is configured such that light emitted from said plasmonic antenna array has an anisotropic angle distribution such that a first portion of light emitted in a first direction perpendicular to said antenna array plane is larger than a second portion of light emitted in a second direction perpendicular to said antenna array plane, said second direction being the opposite of said first direction.

7. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein said plasmonic antenna array is configured such that light emitted from said plasmonic antenna array has an anisotropic angle distribution such that a first angle distribution in a first direction in relation to said antenna array plane is different from a second angle distribution in a second direction in relation to said antenna array plane, said second direction being the opposite of said first direction.

8. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein said antenna elements are arranged on a first layer having a first refractive index, and wherein said antenna elements are embedded in a second layer having a second refractive index different from said first refractive index.

9. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein said antenna elements are arranged on a first layer and embedded in and covered by a second layer, and wherein a third layer is arranged on said second layer, said third layer having a refractive index different from a refractive index of said second layer.

10. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein each of said plurality of antenna elements has an asymmetric shape.

11. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein each of said plurality of antenna elements has the shape of a pyramid, a truncated pyramid, a cone or a truncated cone.

12. The illumination device according to claim 11 , wherein an antenna element in the shape of a truncated pyramid has bottom side length in the range of 100 to 300 nm and a top side length in the range of 30 to 150 nm, and an antenna element in the shape of a truncated cone has bottom diameter in the range of 100 to 300 nm and a top diameter in the range of 30 to 100 nm, and a height in the range of 100 to 200 nm.

13. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein said antenna elements comprises a metal selected from the group comprising Ag, Al, Ga and Au.

14. The illumination device according to claim 1 , comprising a first periodic plasmonic antenna array in a first portion of said illumination device and a second periodic plasmonic antenna array in a second portion of said illumination device,

wherein said first periodic plasmonic antenna array is configured to comprise out-of-plane asymmetric plasmon resonance modes in a first wavelength range, and said second periodic plasmonic antenna array is configured to comprise out-of-plane asymmetric plasmon resonance modes in a second wavelength range, different from said first wavelength range.

15. The illumination device according to claim 14 , wherein said first and second periodic plasmonic antenna array are non-overlapping and are arranged in the same plane or wherein said first and second periodic plasmonic antenna array are arranged in different planes.

16. The illumination device according to claim 1 , wherein the periodic plasmonic antenna array is arranged on a portion of said illumination device not covered by another periodic plasmonic antenna array.