Magnetic Dipole Scattering from Metallic Nanowire for Ultrasensitive Deflection Sensing

It is generally believed that when a single metallic nanowire is sufficiently small, it scatters like a point electric dipole. We show theoretically when a metallic nanowire is placed inside specially designed beams, the magnetic dipole contribution along with the electric dipole resonance can lead to unidirectional scattering in the far field, fulfilling Kerker’s condition. Remarkably, this far-field unidirectional scattering encodes information that is highly dependent on the nanowire’s deflection at a scale much smaller than the wavelength. The special roles of small but essential magnetic response along with the plasmonic resonance are highlighted for this extreme sensitivity as compared with the dielectric counterpart. In addition, the same essential role of the magnetic dipole contribution is also presented for a very small metallic nanosphere.