Slow light in dielectric composite materials of metal nanoparticles

We propose a method for slowing down light pulses by using composites doped with metal nanoparticles. The underlying mechanism is related to the saturable absorption near the plasmon resonance in a pump-probe regime, leading to strong dispersion of the probe refractive index and significantly reduced group velocities. By using a non-collinear scheme, we predict a total fractional delay of 43. This scheme promises simple and compact slow-light on-chip devices with tunable delay and THz bandwidth. (C) 2012 Optical Society of America