Near-field mechanism of the enhanced broadband magneto-optical activity of hybrid Au loaded Bi:YIG

We unravel the underlying near-field mechanism of the enhancement of the magneto-optical activity of bismuth-substituted yttrium iron garnet films (Bi:YIG) loaded with gold nanoparticles. The experimental results show that the embedded gold nanoparticles lead to a broadband enhancement of the magneto-optical activity with respect to the activity of the bare Bi:YIG films. Full vectorial near- and far-field simulations demonstrate that this broadband enhancement is the result of a magneto-optically enabled cross-talking of orthogonal localized plasmon resonances. Our results pave the way to the on-demand design of the magneto-optical properties of hybrid magneto-plasmonic circuitry.