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Hybrid nanophotonic structures are structures that integrate different nanoscale platforms to harness light-matter interaction. We propose that combinations of plasmonic antennas inside modest-Q dielectric cavities can lead to very high Purcell factors, yielding plasmonic mode volumes at essentially cavity quality factors. The underlying physics is subtle: for instance, how plasmon antennas with large cross sections spoil or improve cavities and vice
versa, contains physics beyond perturbation theory, depending on interplays of back-action, and interferences. This is evident from the fact that the local density of states of hybrid systems shows the rich physics of Fano interferences. I will discuss recent scattering experiments performed on toroidal microcavities coupled to plasmon particle arrays that probe both cavity resonance shifts and particle polarizability changes illustrating these insights. Furthermore I will present our efforts to probe single plasmon antennas coupled to emitters and complex environments using scatterometry. An integral part of this approach is the recently developed measurement method of `k-space polarimetry’, a microscopy technique to completely classify the intensity and polarization state of light radiated by a single nano-object into any emission direction that is based on back focal plane imaging and Stokes polarimetry. I show benchmarks of this technique for the cases of scattering, fluorescence, and cathodoluminescence applied to directional surface plasmon polariton antennas.
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