OpenSANS: A Semi-Analytical solver for Nonlocal plasmonicS

Prompted by the renewed interest the past decade in the hydrodynamic model for the description of nanoplasmonic systems, we present OpenSANS, a MATLAB toolbox for the simulation of canonical (that is, standalone spherical and cylindrical) nanoparticles and planar stratified structures whose critical dimensions are of mere nanometres. The method comprises of a generalisation of Mie theory to properly address the hydrodynamic motion of free electrons in metals and a compact S matrix formulation for the efficient treatment of multiple layers. The toolbox is built in a modular manner; each part (routine) has its own important functionality and can be used independently from the others. Our primary goal is the presentation of a highly efficient and accessible solver for the nanoplasmonics community. This is achieved by the very semi-analyticity of the chosen method and by powerful vectorisation techniques optimised in a very popular environment, MATLAB.