Zhengtong Liu

Enhanced localized fluorescence in plasmonic nanoantennae

Pairs of gold elliptical nanoparticles form antennae, resonant in the visible. A dye, embedded in a dielectric host, coats the antennae; its emission excites plasmon resonances in the antennae and is enhanced. Far-field excitation of the dye-nanoantenna system shows a wavelength-dependent increase in fluorescence that reaches 100 times enhancement. Near-field excitation shows enhanced fluorescence from a single nanoantenna localized in a subwavelength area of ∼0.15μm2. The polarization of enhanced emission is along the main antenna axis. These observed experimental results are important for increasing light extraction from emitters localized around antennae and for potential development of a subwavelength sized laser.

Nanoantenna array-induced fluorescence enhancement and reduced lifetimes

Enhanced fluorescence is observed from dye molecules interacting with optical nanoantenna arrays. Elliptical gold dimers form individual nanoantennae with tunable plasmon resonances depending upon the geometry of the two particles and the size of the gap between them. A fluorescent dye, Rhodamine 800, is uniformly embedded in a dielectric host that coats the nanoantennae. The nanoantennae act to enhance the dye absorption. In turn, emission from the dye drives the plasmon resonance of the antennae; the nanoantennae act to enhance the fluorescence signal and change the angular distribution of emission. These effects depend upon the overlap of the plasmon resonance with the excitation wavelength and the fluorescence emission band. A decreased fluorescence lifetime is observed along with highly polarized emission that displays the characteristics of the nanoantennas dipole mode. Being able to engineer the emission of the dye?nanoantenna system is important for future device applications in both bio-sensing and nanoscale optoelectronic integration.

Near-field excitation of nanoantenna resonance

An array of paired elliptic nanoparticles designed to enhance local fields around the particle pair is fabricated with gold embedded in quartz. Light excites a coupled plasmon resonance in the particle pair and the system acts like a plasmonic nanoantenna providing an enhanced electromagnetic field. Near-field scanning optical microscopy and finite element modeling are used to study the local field effects of the nanoantenna system. Local illumination shows similar resonant properties as plane wave illumination: a strong, localized optical resonance for light polarized parallel to the main, center-to-center axis.

Stochastic optimization of low-loss optical negative-index metamaterial

Optical metamaterial consisting of metal-dielectric composites creates a complicated system that is not amenable to analytical solutions. This presents a challenge in optimizing these intricate systems. We present the application of three nature-inspired stochastic optimization techniques in conjunction with fast numerical electromagnetic solvers to yield a metamaterial that satisfies a required design criterion. In particular, three stochastic optimization tools (genetic algorithm, particle swarm optimization, and simulated annealing) are used for designing a low-loss optical negative index metamaterial. A negative refractive index around −0.8+0.2i is obtained at a wavelength of 770 nm. The particle swarm optimization algorithm is found to be the most efficient in this case.

Translation of nanoantenna hot spots by a metal-dielectric composite superlens

We employ numerical simulations to show that highly localized, enhanced electromagnetic fields, also known as “hot spots,” produced by a periodic array of silver nanoantennas can be spatially translated to the other side of a metal-dielectric composite superlens. The proposed translation of the hot spots enables surface-enhanced optical spectroscopy without the undesirable contact of molecules with metal, and thus it broadens and reinforces the potential applications of sensing based on field-enhanced fluorescence and surface-enhanced Raman scattering.

The validation of the parallel three-dimensional solver for analysis of optical plasmonic bi-periodic multilayer nanostructures

Fundamentals of the three-dimensional spatial harmonic analysis (SHA) approach are reviewed, and the advantages of a fast-converging formulation versus the initial SHA formulation are emphasized with examples using periodic plasmonic nanostructures. First, two independent parallel versions of both formulations are implemented using the scattering matrix algorithm for multilayer cascading. Then, by comparing the results from both formulations, it is shown that choosing an advanced fast-converging scheme could be essential for accurate and efficient modeling of plasmonic structures. Important obstacles to the fast parallel implementation of this approach are also revealed. The results of test simulations are validated using the data obtained from a commercial finite-element method (FEM) simulations and from the experimental characterization of fabricated samples.

Near field enhancement in silver nanoantenna-superlens systems

We demonstrate near field enhancement generation in silver nanoantenna-superlens systems via numerical modeling. Using near-field interference and global optimization algorithms, we can design nanoantenna-superlens systems with mismatched permittivities, whose performance can match those with matched permittivities. The systems studied here may find broad applications in the fields of sensing, such as field-enhanced fluorescence and surface-enhanced Raman scattering, and the methodology used here can be applied to the designing and optimization of other devices, such as two-dimensional near field focusing lens.

Fabricating Plasmonic Components for Nano- and Meta-Photonics

Different fabrication approaches for realization of metal-dielectric structures supporting propagating and localized surface plasmons are described including fabrication of nanophotonic waveguides and plasmonic nanoantennae.

Studies of plasmonic hot-spot translation by a metal-dielectric layered superlens

We have studied the ability of a lamellar near-field superlens to transfer an enhanced electromagnetic field to the far side of the lens. In this work, we have experimentally and numerically investigated superlensing in the visible range. By using the resonant hot-spot field enhancements from optical nanoantennas as sources, we investigated the translation of these sources to the far side of a layered silver-silica superlens operating in the canalization regime. Using near-field scanning optical microscopy (NSOM), we have observed evidence of superlens-enabled enhanced-field translation at a wavelength of about 680 nm. Specifically, we discuss our recent experimental and simulation results on the translation of hot spots using a silver-silica layered superlens design. We compare the experimental results with our numerical simulations and discuss the perspectives and limitations of our approach.

Improving Au Nanoantenna Resonance by Annealing

Nanoantenna plasmonic absorption is enhanced using an annealing technique. The annealed Au nanoantenna array shows sharper resonances and twice the peak absorption versus those in the initially fabricated array before annealing.