Control of the local photonic density of states above magneto-optical metamaterials

Abstract

The local density of states (LDOS) of electromagnetic field drives many basic processes associated to light-matter interaction such as the thermal emission of object, the spontaneous emission of quantum systems or the fluctuation-induced electromagnetic forces on molecules. Here, we study the LDOS in the close vicinity of magneto-optical metamaterials under the action of an external magnetic field and demonstrate that it can be efficiently changed in a narrow or a broad spectral range simply by changing the spatial orientation or the magnitude of this field. This result paves the way for an active control of the photonic density of states at deep-subwavelength scale.