Probing the Ultimate Limits of Plasmonic Enhancement

Probing the mechanisms of large Purcell enhancement in plasmonic nanoantennas

To move nanophotonic devices such as lasers and single-photon sources into the practical realm, a challenging list of requirements must be met, including directional emission1–5, room-temperature and broadband operation6–9, high radiative quantum efficiency1,4 and a large spontaneous emission rate7. To achieve these features simultaneously, a platform is needed for which the various decay chann...

Detection limits in whispering gallery biosensors with plasmonic enhancement

Taking cascaded plasmonic field enhancement to the ultimate limit in silver nanoparticle dimers

Cascaded optical field enhancement in coupled plasmonic nanostructures has attracted significant attention because of field enhancement factors that dramatically exceed those observed in isolated nanostructures. While previous studies demonstrated the existence of cascaded enhancement, little work has been done to identify the requirements for achieving maximum field enhancement. Here, we inves...

Probing the Limits of Representation

Optical Chirality Enhancement in Twisted Arrays of Plasmonic Nano-rods

An important property of electromagnetic fields, which arises from the interaction between fields and chiral molecules, is called optical chirality. By enhancing this field property, while maintaining constant input power, we are able to increase absorption of circularly polarized light by chiral molecules of a certain handedness. This enhancement is achieved through the use of achiral plasmoni...