An efficient transient solver for photothermal properties of metallic nanostructures

This Letter focuses on a remarkable simulation tool for the photothermal properties of the metallic nanostructures. A fully coupled method is established based on Maxwell's equations and the law of heat conduction in the time domain. This method is different from the conventional co-simulation scheme with a steady-state optical field and a transient thermal field, offering a more versatile approach for analyzing photothermal characteristics. To effectively evaluate the photothermal coupling effect, the discontinuous Galerkin technique is utilized. Furthermore, the time-scaling approach is introduced to address the multiscale nature of the temporal responses between the light and heat fields. Thus, an efficient numerical solver for the photothermal properties of metallic nanostructures is developed. Numerical examples demonstrate the remarkable accuracy and efficiency of the proposed method. Therefore, this approach can provide an essential theoretical tool for designing dynamically reconfigurable nano-devices.