Super scattering phenomenon in active spherical nanoparticles

Localized surface electromagnetic resonances in spherical nanoparticles with gain are investigated by using the Mie theory. Due to the coupling between the gain and resonances, super scattering phenomenon is raised and the total scattering efficiency is increased by over six orders of magnitude. The dual frequency resonance induced by the electric dipole term of the particle is observed. The distributions of electromagnetic field and the Poynting vector around nanoparticles are provided for better understanding different multipole resonances. Finally, the scattering properties of active spherical nanoparticles are investigated when the sizes of nanoparticles are beyond the quasi-static limit. It is noticed that more highorder multipole resonances can be excited with the increase of the radius. Besides, all resonances dominated by multipole magnetic terms can only appear in dielectric materials.     

Tailoring magnetic and electric resonances with dielectric nanocubes for broadband and high-efficiency unidirectional scattering

The interference of optically induced electric and magnetic resonances in high-refractive-index dielectric nanoparticles provides a new approach to control and shape the scattering patterns of light in the field of nanophotonics. In this Letter, we spectrally tune the electric and magnetic resonances by varying the geometry of a single isolated lead telluride(Pb Te) dielectric nanocube. Then, we overlap the electric dipole resonance and magnetic dipole resonance to suppress backward scattering and enhance forward scattering in the resonance region.Furthermore, a broadband unidirectional scattering is achieved by structuring the dielectric nanocuboids as a trimer antenna.     

太赫兹波段超材料的制作、设计及应用

本文从制作方法、结构设计和材料选择几方面综述了超材料在太赫兹波段的电磁响应特性和潜在应用。首先,介绍了获得不同维度、具有特异电磁响应以及结构可调超材料的各种微加工制作方法,进而分析和讨论了超材料的电磁响应特性。文中指出,结构设计可以控制超材料的电磁响应特性,如各向异性、双各向异性、偏振调制、多频响应、宽带响应、不对称透射、旋光性和超吸收等。超材料的电磁响应依赖于周围微环境的介电性质,因而可用于制作对环境敏感的传感器件。此外,电光、磁光、相变、温度敏感等功能材料的引入可以获得光场、电场、磁场、温度等主动控制的太赫兹功能器件。最后,简单介绍了超材料在太赫兹波段进一步发展所面临的机遇和挑战。     

一种基于旋转调谐的超材料

数值仿真研究了一种可调谐的双开口谐振环(DSRR)超材料.在平行入射的电磁波激励下,这种DSRR单元可以在不同的频段分别表现出磁谐振和电谐振.当外加电场E与DSRR的双开口平行时,DSRR受激励得到的磁谐振和电谐振强度最大.随着DSRR超材料沿外加磁场H方向顺时针旋转,其磁谐振和电谐振频率基本保持不变,但谐振强度均发生显著下降,同时对应透射相位的突变也逐渐降低.提出的超材料调谐方法只需要简单地旋转材料,而不需要改变原有超材料单元的结构或者增加额外的激励场,极大地简化了可调谐超材料的制备及应用,在电磁开关、相位调制等方面具有潜在的应用.同时,这种简单的方法有希望应用于更高频段的超材料调谐,可以有效地拓展太赫兹频段和光频段超材料的实际应用.     

Ag-Al纳米球二聚体的光学性质研究

金属纳米材料因其表面等离子体共振特性而备受关注。异质结构的金属纳米材料的光学特性相比于同质结构因其材料的不同破坏了原有结构的对称性,对称性的破坏将引起光学性质的改变,相邻两个颗粒之间的相互作用会产生Fano共振。Fano共振是由异质纳米结构的表面等离子体共振耦合引起的,通过合理地调控表面等离子体共振的耦合,将进一步调控Fano共振的强度同时促使异质结构的电场增强特性和辐射特性得到进一步优化。受金银等贵金属的带间跃迁影响,金属铝纳米材料成为研究紫外-近紫外光区的表面等离子体共振研究最佳选择。采用有限时域差分方法研究了Ag-Al纳米球二聚体的光学特性。研究了Ag和Al纳米球组成的二聚体的吸收光谱与入射光偏振方向、纳米球半径、颗粒间距和介质折射率等几何结构及物理参数的关系,并深入讨论了二聚体的局域场分布规律;讨论了获取更高效的Fano共振光谱的方法。由于材料的对称性被破坏,异质二聚体的光学性质与同质二聚体明显不同,Ag-Al异质纳米球二聚体呈现出在紫外和可见光区的双Fano共振现象。Ag-Al二聚体表面等离子体互相耦合引起Fano共振从而导致表面等离子体的共振抑制和增强。研究结果对在紫外-可见光区的表面等离子体应用、纳米光学器件的设计与开发及基于表面等离子体共振的表面增强光谱、生物传感和检测研究等有一定参考价值。     

Engineering the plasmon resonance of large area bimetallic nanoparticle films by laser nanostructuring for chemical sensors

Large area fabrication of metal alloy nanoparticles with tunable surface plasmon resonances on low-cost substrates is reported. A UV excimer laser was used to anneal 5 nm thick Ag Au bilayer films deposited with different composition ratios to create alloy nanoparticles. These engineered surfaces are used to investigate how the wavelength of the surface plasmon resonance affects the optical detection capability of chemical species by surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy.     

Polarization control over electric and magnetic dipole resonances of dielectric nanoparticles on metallic films

We reveal unusually strong polarization sensitivity of electric and magnetic dipole resonances of high‐index dielectric nanoparticles placed on a metallic film. By employing dark‐field spectroscopy, we observe the polarization‐controlled transformation from high‐Q magnetic‐dipole scattering to broadband suppression of scattering associated with the electric dipole mode, and show numerically that it is accompanied by a strong enhancement of the respective fields by the nanoparticle. Our experimental data for silicon nanospheres are in an excellent agreement with both analytical calculations based on Green's function approach and the full‐wave numerical simulations. Our findings further substantiate dielectric nanoparticles as strong candidates for many applications in enhanced sensing, spectroscopy and nonlinear processes at the nanoscale.

     

一种新型介质结构的超传输电磁特性研究

光入射到不同折射率材料的分界面时会很自然地产生反射现象. 在很多的工业应用中, 例如太阳能电池, 衬底的引入会在其表面产生反射损耗. 至今为止, 人们提出很多方法用来克服这一问题, 比较常见的有介质涂层、表面纹理、绝热折射率匹配和散射等离激元纳米粒子. 本文利用二维周期排布的亚波长级硅纳米圆柱阵列来降低衬底表面的反射. 结合辅助微分方程和时域有限差分法对该结构的散射特性进行系统研究, 结果发现, 纳米圆柱粒子能够产生类似于在金属表面发生的超传输现象, 这种现象的发生基于介质衬底耦合Mie共振机理, 该机理能在整个紫外到近红外光谱范围内将能量耦合到衬底中, 从而降低衬底表面的反射; 同时当散射结构被放置在具有高光学态密度的高折射率衬底附近时, 会产生较强的前向散射, 也能有效的减少后向散射即反射的发生. 基于降低衬底表面反射这一目的而言, 我们设计的结构可为实际太阳能电池及光学天线的设计提供参考.     

Optical response of Lorentzian nanospheres in the quasistatic limit

Significance of the Lorentzian dispersion relationship in controlling the optical response of the nanospheres surrounded by a homogeneous non-absorbing dielectric medium is examined. Nanospheres with size much smaller than the wavelength of the incident light are considered as prototype systems that can cover the generic optical response of Lorentzian nanoparticles. Absorption cross-section of the Lorentzian nanospheres is treated in the quasistatic approximation of classical electrodynamics and the resulting optical resonance is evaluated in terms of its dependencies on the parameters of the system. It has been illustrated that the underlying dispersion governs both the amount and the direction of the shift experienced by the optical resonance of nanospheres. Contrary to Drude nanospheres (well-known red shifters), Lorentzian nanospheres are shown to be blue shifters of the optical resonance. The amount of blue shift is dominated by the increase in the oscillator strength of the nanosphere material. Embedding media with higher dielectric constant and/or materials with larger high frequency dielectric constant lead to a suppression of the amount of blue shift induced by the oscillator strength. Further quantification of the blue shift characteristics against the red shift characteristics of Drude nanospheres is provided. The results can be instrumental for manipulating the optical response of plexcitonic nanophotonic devices.     

The Evaluation of Dielectric Resonators Containing H2O or D2O as RF Coils for High-Field MR Imaging and Spectroscopy

Electromagnetic resonators consisting of low-loss dielectric material and/or metallic boundaries are widely used in microwave technologies. These dielectric resonators usually have high Q factors and well-defined field distributions. Magnetic resonance imaging was shown as a way of visualizing the magnetic field distribution of the resonant modes of these resonators, if the dielectric body contains NMR sensitive nuclei. Dielectric resonators have also been proposed as RF coils for magnetic resonance experiments. The feasibility of this idea in high-field MR is discussed here. Specifically, the dielectric resonances of cylindrical water columns were characterized at 170.7 MHz (4 T¹H Larmor frequency), and evaluated as NMR transmit and receive coils. The dielectric resonance of a cylindrical volume of D₂O was used to image a hand at 170.7 MHz. This study demonstrated that MRI is an effective way of visualizing the magnetic field in dielectric structures such as a water cylinder, and can potentially be generalized to solid-state dielectric devices. The possible applications of dielectric resonators other than simple cylindrical volumes in MRI and MR solution spectroscopy at high field strengths are also discussed.     

基模磁激元诱导的多带完美吸收

本文提出一种方向不敏感多带吸收的新结构,即结合光学声子色散材料及无色散介电材料,将其作为单一尺寸金属/介质/金属微光栅的介质分离层。在红外大气窗口波段激发了基模磁激元谐振因此导致多频带吸收。基于有限元方法求解了混合结构的吸收率及电磁场分布,并研究了入射角及结构参数的变化对多峰值吸收的影响。考虑到磁激元的本质是由金属光栅下表面与金属基底上表面诱导出反向电流震荡引起,多层介质膜起到介电隔离层的作用。对多层介质膜进行等效介质理论近似,并通过等效LC电路预测和分析了基模磁激元谐振频点。本文所提出的多带吸收机理在红外探测、辐射制冷领等域具有应用前景。     

Physics in plasmonic and Mie scattered near-field for efficient surface-enhanced Raman scattering template

We describe the physics of the SERS based on the optical near-field intensity enhancement on the metallic (plasmonic) and the nonmetallic (Mie scattering) nanostructured substrates with two-dimensional (2D) periodic nanohole arrays. The calculation by the Finite-Difference Time-Domain (FDTD) method revealed that the optical intensity enhancement increases with the increase of the thickness of a gold film coating on the nonmetallic (dielectric) nanostructured Si, GaAs, and SiC substrates. The resonance spectrum shifts with the changes in the geometrical structure of the void diameter and inter-void distance. It was clarified that the optical intensity enhancement obtained with the gold-coated substrate is equivalent to that with a gold substrate at 70-nm thick gold coating on the dielectric substrates in this structure. The resonance spectral bandwidth for Mie scattering and plasmonic near-fields is different. Therefore, if the Stokes line of the Raman scattering is located within the resonance bandwidth, the SERS signal is enhanced proportionally to the fourth power of the electric near-field. However, if the Stokes shift is located out of the resonance bandwidth, the SERS signal enhancement is only proportional to the square of the scattered near-field.     

New progress of plasmonics in complex metal nanostructures

Noble metal nanostructures possess novel optical properties because of their collective electronic oscillations,known as surface plasmons(SPs).The resonance of SPs strongly depends on the material,surrounding environment,as well as the geometry of the nanostructures.Complex metal nanostructures have attracted research interest because of the degree of freedom in tailoring the plasmonic properties for more advanced applications that are unattainable by simple ones.In this review,we discuss the plasmonic properties of several typical types of complex metal nanostructures,that is,electromagnetically coupled nanoparticles(NPs),NPs/metal films,NPs/nanowires(NWs),NWs/NWs,and metal nanostructures supported or coated by dielectrics.The electromagnetic field enhancement and surface-enhanced Raman scattering applications are mainly discussed in the NPs systems where localized SPs have a key role.Propagating surface plasmon polaritons and relevant applications in plasmonic routers and logic gates using NWs network are also reviewed.The effect of dielectric substrates and surroundings of metal nanostructures to the plasmonic properties is also discussed.     

Dielectric layer-dependent surface plasmon effect of metallic nanoparticles on silicon substrate

The electromagnetic interaction between Ag nanoparticles on the top of the Si substrate and the incident light has been studied by numerical simulations. It is found that the presence of dielectric layers with different thicknesses leads to the varied resonance wavelength and scattering cross section and consequently the shifted photocurrent response for all wavelengths. These different behaviours are determined by whether the dielectric layer is beyond the domain where the elcetric field of metallic plasmons takes effect, combined with the effect of geometrical optics. It is revealed that for particles of a certain size, an appropriate dielectric thickness is desirable to achieve the best absorption. For a certain thickness of spacer, an appropriate granular size is also desirable. These observations have substantial applications for the optimization of surface plasmon enhanced silicon solar cells.     

Electromagnetic transparency and slow light in an isotropic 3D optical metamaterial, due to Fano-like coupling of Mie resonances in excitonic nano-sphere inclusions

A three dimensional isotropic metamaterial is proposed and theoretically studied, which is composed of excitonic spherical nanoparticles in a dielectric host and exhibits electromagnetic transparency and slow light effects in optical regime. The approach is different from the conventional methods of realizing classical Electromagnetically Induced Transparency (EIT) or plasmon induced transparency effects, which are usually based on the interaction of dark and bright states of the medium plasmonic constituents. Instead, it is based on the Fano-like coupling of Mie resonances in the spherical inclusions, resulting from sharp and strong excitonic resonance of the particles. Using the Extended Maxwell Garnett effective medium approximation for calculating the effective electromagnetic parameters of the proposed metamaterial structure, it is shown that EIT-like effects can be produced, such as steep normal dispersion profiles within narrow transparency windows, resulting in high values of group index of refraction on the order of several thousands and figure of merit values around 10, near the excitonic resonance of the nanoparticle inclusions in UV region.     

Interplay between out-of-plane magnetic plasmon and lattice resonance for modified resonance lineshape and near-field enhancement in double nanoparticles array

Two-dimensional double nanoparticle （DNP） arrays are demonstrated theoretically, supporting the interaction between out-of-plane magnetic plasmons and in-plane lattice resonances, which can be achieved by tuning the nanoparticle height or the array period due to the height-dependent magnetic resonance and the periodicity-dependent lattice resonance. The interplay between the two plasmon modes can lead to a remarkable change in resonance lineshape and an improvement on magnetic field enhancement. Simultaneous electric field and magnetic field enhancement can be obtained in the gap region between neighboring particles at two resonance frequencies as the interplay occurs, which presents “open” cavities as electromagnetic field hot spots for potential applications on detection and sensing. The results not only offer an attractive way to tune the optical responses of plasmonic nanostructure, but also provide further insight into the plasmon interactions in periodic nanostructure or metamaterials comprising multiple elements.     

Influence of local environment on the intensity of the localized surface plasmon polariton of Ag nanoparticles

A combined Ag nanoparticle with an insulating or conductive layer structure has been designed for molecular detection using surface enhanced Raman scattering microscopy. Optical absorption studies revealed localized surface plasmon resonance, which shows regular red shift with increasing environmental dielectric constant. With the combined structure of surface enhanced Raman scattering substrates and rhodamine 6G as a test molecule, the results in this paper show that the absorption has a linear relationship with the local electromagnetic field for insulating substrates, and the electrical property of the substrate has a non-negligible effect on the intensity of the local electromagnetic field and hence the Raman enhancement.     

Resonant Lattice Kerker Effect in Metasurfaces With Electric and Magnetic Optical Responses

To achieve efficient light control at subwavelength dimensions, plasmonic and all‐dielectric nanoparticles have been utilized both as a single element as well as in the arrays. Here we study 2D periodic nanoparticle arrays (metasurfaces) that support lattice resonances near the Rayleigh anomaly due to the electric dipole (ED) and magnetic dipole (MD) resonant coupling between the nanoparticles. Silicon and core‐shell particles are considered. Our investigations are carried out using two independent numerical techniques, namely, the finite‐element method and the method of coupled‐dipole equations based on the Green function approach. We numerically demonstrate that choosing of lattice periods independently in each mutual‐perpendicular direction, it is possible to achieve a full overlap between the ED‐lattice resonance and MD resonances of nanoparticles in certain spectral range and to realize the resonant lattice Kerker effect (resonant suppression of the backward scattering or reflection). At the effect conditions, the strong suppression of light reflectance in the structure is appeared due to destructive interference between electromagnetic waves scattered by ED and MD moments of every nanoparticle in the backward direction with respect to the incident light wave. Influence of the array size on the revealed reflectance and transmittance behavior is discussed. The resonant lattice Kerker effect based on the overlap of both ED and MD lattice resonances is also demonstrated.     

全介质光栅在太赫兹波段的光调控特性

采用激光直写技术在100 μm厚的Si衬底上制备了全介质光栅结构, 利用近红外光抽运-太赫兹探测(near infrared pump-Terahertz probe)技术对该全介质光栅在THz波段的光谱响应及其光调控特性进行了测试, 最后结合电磁仿真结果, 对米谐振(Mie resonance)的形成机理和光调控机理进行了解释并对调控光作用下全介质光栅的电导率数值进行了估算. 研究结果表明: 在光栅与THz偏振垂直的情况下, 该全介质光栅在0-1.0 THz范围内有3个典型的米谐振峰且谐振模式各不相同; 随着调控光功率的增加, 3个谐振峰的谐振强度出现了不同程度的减弱, 其中第一个谐振峰的光调控幅度达到50%以上, 调控光作用下米谐振强度的减弱是由于光生载流子对入射THz波的吸收和散射导致了介质光栅内部感生电磁场减弱引起的. 上述工作对全介质超材料在THz波段的共振特性研究和相关光调控器件的研制具有重要参考价值.     

光学共振增强的表面铯激活银纳米结构光阴极

金属光阴极因其超短脉冲发射和运行寿命长的特性从而具有重要应用价值,但是较高的功函数和较强的电子散射使其需要采用高能量紫外光子激发且光电发射量子效率极低.本文利用Mie散射共振效应增强银纳米颗粒中的局域光学态密度,提升光吸收率和电子的输运效率,并利用激活层降低银的功函数,从而增强光阴极在可见光区的量子效率.采用时域有限差分方法分析银纳米球阵列的光学共振特性,采用磁控溅射和退火工艺在银/氧化锡铟复合衬底上制备银纳米球,紧接着在其表面沉积制备铯激活层,最后在高真空腔体中测试光电发射量子效率.实验结果表明平均粒径150 nm的银纳米球光阴极在425 nm波长的量子效率超过0.35%,为相同激活条件下银薄膜光阴极的12倍,峰值波长与理论计算的Mie共振波长相符合.