Wireless at the Nanoscale: Towards Magnetically Tunable Beam Steering

Plasmonic wireless nanolinks hold great promise to overcome limitations from conventional metallic wires, namely narrow bandwidths, Ohmic losses, dispersion and cross-talking. However, current developments are limited to the wireless communication between two fixed points, i.e., a fixed transmitter with a fixed receiver, which in turn limits the energy efficiency and integration levels. In this work, we propose the use of magnetic fields for active tuning of the radiation beam steering of plasmonic nanoantennas. The physical principle behind our concept is shown with rigorous solution of the radiation pattern of a radiating dipolar source in the presence of magnetic fields. The results indicate that the proposed scheme is feasible with plasmonic nanoantennas made of ferromagnetic or noble metals in the presence of an applied magnetic field.