Directional Control of Chiral Polymer Emission Dissymmetry by Plasmonic Metasurfaces

Abstract

Circularly polarized (CP) emission is central to next-generation photonic and optoelectronic technologies, yet simultaneously controlling its directionality, intensity, and handedness remains a major challenge. Advances in molecular and materials design have enabled strong chiral light-matter interactions and large dissymmetry between opposite CP states. However, conventional thin-film architectures provide limited control over the angular distribution of CP emission and often exhibit strongly angle-dependent chiral emission. Metasurfaces, on the other hand, offer powerful control over emission directionality and polarization, but have predominantly been explored with intrinsically achiral emitters. For the first time, we integrate organic chiral polymer thin films with planar chiral plasmonic metasurfaces to enhance chiral light-matter interactions while controlling the directionality and angular dependence of chiral emission. Using angle-resolved Stokes Fourier polarimetry, we show that metasurface coupling produces directional emission, near-normal dissymmetry factors exceeding 0.7, and, remarkably, direction-dependent reversal of the emission handedness at fixed molecular stereochemistry.