Nano-Engineered Plasmonic Nanomaterials

A special issue of Nanomaterials (ISSN 2079-4991).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (25 July 2020) | Viewed by 11268

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, Hokkaido University, Kita-10, Nishi-8, Kita-ku, Sapporo 060-0810, Japan
Interests: plasmon-based physics and chemistry; nanofabrication; microspectroscopy; plasmonic Fano resonance; vibrational strong coupling

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Nanoparticles of noble metals showing localized surface plasmon resonances (LSPRs) have received considerable attention as materials that enhance light–matter coupling extraordinarily. The effect of near-field enhancement by LSPRs is known to be induced at the sharp tip of metallic nanostructures and/or the gap between adjacent nanostructures. Namely, spectral properties and near-field enhancement effects are highly dependent on the size, shape, and arrangement of metallic nanostructures. Therefore, well-defined metallic nanostructures have been fabricated by nano-processing methods to elucidate the essence of the resonance phenomenon, depending on the inter structure distance, and construct metallic nanostructures that show strong near-field enhancement. Such nano-engineered plasmonic nanomaterials have been applied to chemical and biosensors utilizing surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) as well as LSPR sensors, light–energy conversion systems as light-harvesting optical antennae, surface plasmon amplification by stimulated emission of radiation (SPASER) for realizing lasers at the nanometer scale, nano-processing technologies, and so forth. Over the last decade, nano-engineered plasmonic nanomaterials have been employed for the study of various types of plasmonic coupling systems such as exciton–plasmon strong coupling, plasmon-hybridization, modal strong coupling, and/or plasmonic Fano resonances, and electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT), which are characteristics of the structure of Metamaterials. Recently, the structures have also received great interest as a metasurface for constructing significant optical elements. Thus, the nano-engineered plasmonic materials are studied in a wide variety of research fields. This Special Issue contains the above-mentioned research topics.

Prof. Dr. Kosei Ueno
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • Lithography
  • Surface plasmon
  • Sensors
  • SERS
  • Light-energy conversions
  • SPASER
  • Metamaterials
  • Metasurface
  • Fano resonance
  • Strong coupling

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

10 pages, 2831 KiB  
Article
Dynamically Modulating Plasmonic Field by Tuning the Spatial Frequency of Excitation Light
by Sen Wang, Minghua Sun, Shanqin Wang, Maixia Fu, Jingwen He and Xing Li
Nanomaterials 2020, 10(8), 1449; https://doi.org/10.3390/nano10081449 - 24 Jul 2020
Viewed by 2228
Abstract
Based on the Fourier transform (FT) of surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs), the relation between the displacement of the plasmonic field and the spatial frequency of the excitation light is theoretically established. The SPPs’ field shifts transversally or longitudinally when the spatial frequency components [...] Read more.
Based on the Fourier transform (FT) of surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs), the relation between the displacement of the plasmonic field and the spatial frequency of the excitation light is theoretically established. The SPPs’ field shifts transversally or longitudinally when the spatial frequency components f x or f y are correspondingly changed. The SPPs’ focus and vortex field can be precisely located at the desired position by choosing the appropriate spatial frequency. Simulation results are in good agreement with the theoretical analyses. Dynamically tailoring the plasmonic field based on the spatial frequency modulation can find potential applications in microparticle manipulation and angular multiplexed SPP focusing and propagation. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Nano-Engineered Plasmonic Nanomaterials)
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19 pages, 4264 KiB  
Article
Plasmonic Metasensors Based on 2D Hybrid Atomically Thin Perovskite Nanomaterials
by Shuwen Zeng, Guozhen Liang, Alexandre Gheno, Sylvain Vedraine, Bernard Ratier, Ho-Pui Ho and Nanfang Yu
Nanomaterials 2020, 10(7), 1289; https://doi.org/10.3390/nano10071289 - 30 Jun 2020
Cited by 17 | Viewed by 3963
Abstract
In this work, we have designed highly sensitive plasmonic metasensors based on atomically thin perovskite nanomaterials with a detection limit up to 10−10 refractive index units (RIU) for the target sample solutions. More importantly, we have improved phase singularity detection with the [...] Read more.
In this work, we have designed highly sensitive plasmonic metasensors based on atomically thin perovskite nanomaterials with a detection limit up to 10−10 refractive index units (RIU) for the target sample solutions. More importantly, we have improved phase singularity detection with the Goos–Hänchen (GH) effect. The GH shift is known to be closely related to optical phase signal changes; it is much more sensitive and sharp than the phase signal in the plasmonic condition, while the experimental measurement setup is much more compact than that of the commonly used interferometer scheme to exact the phase signals. Here, we have demonstrated that plasmonic sensitivity can reach a record-high value of 1.2862 × 109 µm/RIU with the optimum configurations for the plasmonic metasensors. The phase singularity-induced GH shift is more than three orders of magnitude larger than those achievable in other metamaterial schemes, including Ag/TiO2 hyperbolic multilayer metamaterials (HMMs), metal–insulator–metal (MIM) multilayer waveguides with plasmon-induced transparency (PIT), and metasurface devices with a large phase gradient. GH sensitivity has been improved by more than 106 times with the atomically thin perovskite metasurfaces (1.2862 × 109 µm/RIU) than those without (918.9167 µm/RIU). The atomically thin perovskite nanomaterials with high absorption rates enable precise tuning of the depth of the plasmonic resonance dip. As such, one can optimize the structure to reach near zero-reflection at the resonance angle and the associated sharp phase singularity, which leads to a strongly enhanced GH lateral shift at the sensor interface. By integrating the 2D perovskite nanolayer into a metasurface structure, a strong localized electric field enhancement can be realized and GH sensitivity was further improved to 1.5458 × 109 µm/RIU. We believe that this enhanced electric field together with the significantly improved GH shift would enable single molecular or even submolecular detection for hard-to-identify chemical and biological markers, including single nucleotide mismatch in the DNA sequence, toxic heavy metal ions, and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNFα). Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Nano-Engineered Plasmonic Nanomaterials)
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12 pages, 3516 KiB  
Article
Application of the Metal Reflector for Redistributing the Focusing Intensity of SPPs
by Jiaxin Ji, Pengfei Xu, Zhongwen Lin, Jiying Chen, Jing Li and Yonggang Meng
Nanomaterials 2020, 10(5), 937; https://doi.org/10.3390/nano10050937 - 13 May 2020
Viewed by 2292
Abstract
The near-field photolithography system has attracted increasing attention in the micro- and nano-manufacturing field, due to the high efficiency, high resolution, and the low cost of the scheme. Nevertheless, the low quality of the nano-patterns significantly limits the industrial application of this technology. [...] Read more.
The near-field photolithography system has attracted increasing attention in the micro- and nano-manufacturing field, due to the high efficiency, high resolution, and the low cost of the scheme. Nevertheless, the low quality of the nano-patterns significantly limits the industrial application of this technology. Theoretical calculations showed that the reason for the poor nano-patterns is the sharp attenuation of the surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) in the photoresist layer. The calculation results suggest that the waveguide mode, which is composed of the chromium-equivalent dielectric layer-aluminum, can facilitate the energy flux density distribution in the photoresist layer, resulting in the enhancement of the field intensity of SPPs in the photoresist layer. This reduces the linewidth of nano-patterns, while it enhances the pattern steepness. Eventually, the focusing energy of the photoresist layer can be improved. The finite-difference time-domain method was employed to simulate and verify the theoretical results. It is found that for the rotational near-field photolithography with 355 nm laser illumination, the linewidths of the nano-patterns with and without the aluminum reflector are 17.54 nm and 65.51 nm, respectively. The robustness of the experimental results implies that the application of the aluminum reflector enhances the focusing effect in the photoresist, which can broaden the application of the near-field photolithography. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Nano-Engineered Plasmonic Nanomaterials)
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10 pages, 3675 KiB  
Article
The Interference Pattern of Plasmonic and Photonic Modes Manipulated by Slit Width
by Xing Li, Jing Tang, Xuelian Zhang, Ruirui Zhang, Xiangyu Zeng, Zijun Zhan, Chunxiang Liu and Chuanfu Cheng
Nanomaterials 2020, 10(4), 730; https://doi.org/10.3390/nano10040730 - 11 Apr 2020
Viewed by 2269
Abstract
We demonstrate that the interference pattern of the plasmonic and photonic modes can be controlled by changing the slit width of a square slit structure. Based on the analyses of the plasmonic and photonic modes of slits with different widths, we theoretically derived [...] Read more.
We demonstrate that the interference pattern of the plasmonic and photonic modes can be controlled by changing the slit width of a square slit structure. Based on the analyses of the plasmonic and photonic modes of slits with different widths, we theoretically derived the expressions of wavefield generated by a square slit. A far-field scattered imaging system is utilized to collect the intensity distribution experimentally. Various interference patterns, including stripes, square-like lattice array, and diamond-like lattice array, have been observed by adjusting the slit widths. In addition, the results were validated by performing finite-difference time-domain simulations, which are consistent with the theoretical and experimental results. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Nano-Engineered Plasmonic Nanomaterials)
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