Abstract

The use of suspensions of nanoparticles (“soft matter”) for development of new classes of photonic devices and, in particular, for the optofluidic technology widely discussed at present is quite attractive [1]. A ferrofluid (FF) is a stable colloidal solution of single-domain nanoscale magnetic particles that exhibits strong magneto-optic (MO) effects, which is especially tempting for the applications (magnetometers, modulators, switches, optical logic elements, etc.) in which the optical interaction with a magnetic fluid is enhanced by light propagation through a microstructured optical fiber [2]. One of the problems impending application of FF-based devices is their rather slow operation. The experimentally demonstrated characteristic switching times are typically longer than 10⁻⁴ s [3].

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