Active control of highly efficient third-harmonic generation in ultrathin nonlinear metasurfaces

Active electric control of highly efficient third harmonic generation was realized in an ultrathin nonlinear metasurface by using a nanocomposite consisting of gold nanoparticles dispersed in polycrystalline strontium titanate as the electro-optic material. Owing to the nonlinearity enhancement associated with the slow light effect, quantum confinement effect, and field-reinforcement, a high conversion efficiency of 3 × 10−5 was obtained, which is two orders of magnitude larger than previously reported efficiencies at comparable pump intensities. A modulation of 12% in the intensity of the third harmonic generation and a 30-nm shift in the transparency window center were achieved by varying the applied voltage from −30 V to zero. Our results pave the way toward the realization of multi-functional integrated photonic devices and chips based on metasurfaces.