Single-plasmon scattering grating using nanowire surface plasmon coupled to nanodiamond nitrogen-vacancy center.

We investigate the scattering properties of a single surface plasmon in metal nanowire coupled to a nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center in diamond nanocrystal under optical excitation. We demonstrate that, by spatially modulating a classical control beam, alternating regions of high reflection and absorption as well as high transmission and absorption of a single plasmon can be created in the left- and right-going directions that act as a kind of scattering grating. Such approach to induce grating gets out the well investigating region in which the weak interactions between single atoms and light is often used. The proposal may be used for chip-integrated grating, switcher and multi-channel drop filter.