The flower-like nanostructures of an Au core and Pd petals with the average size of 47.8 nm were fabricated through the successive reduction of HAuCl₄ and Na₂PdCl₄ at room temperature. During the synthesis, Cacumen Platycladi leaf extract served as weak reductant and capping agent. Characterization techniques such as Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, UV-Vis spectroscopy, and X-ray diffracti...

We report on the laser action of pyrromethene 567 incorporated into polymeric matrices and pumped longitudinally with the green line of a copper-vapor laser. When the dye was dissolved in a copolymer of methyl methacrylate and pentaerythritol triacrylate, 290 mW average power at 1 kHz ~37% lasing efficiency! was obtained. The laser output decreased to 150 mW after 30 min irradiation time (1.831...

The compensation of loss in metal by gain in interfacing dielectric has been demonstrated in a mixture of aggregated silver nanoparticles and rhodamine 6G dye. An increase of the quality factor of surface plasmon (SP) resonance was evidenced by the sixfold enhancement of Rayleigh scattering. The compensation of plasmonic losses with gain enables a host of new applications for metallic nanostruc...

A new technique is proposed for the fabrication of fine patterns of molecular doping in organic-inorganic hybrid materials by the combination of capillary electrophoresis doping (CED) and photolithography. The UV-induced polymerization of [Formula: see text] bonds in organic groups yields a fine contrast of structures with the desired pattern in organic-inorganic hybrid films, and CED treatment...

The first successful approach to synthesizing ultrabright fluorescent mesoporous silica nanoparticles is reported. Fluorescent dye is physically entrapped inside nanochannels of a silica matrix created during templated sol-gel self-assembly. The problem of dye leakage from open channels is solved by incorporation of hydrophobic groups in the silica matrix. This makes the approach compatible wit...

We investigate the impact of rotational diffusion on the electrodynamic coupling of fluorescent dye molecules (oscillating electric dipoles) to a tunable planar metallic nanocavity. Fast rotational diffusion of the molecules leads to a rapidly fluctuating mode density of the electromagnetic field along the molecules' dipole axis, which significantly changes their coupling to the field as compar...

Through a simple room-temperature photoreduction process, this letter conformally replicates 3D submicrometer structures of wing scales from two butterfly species into Ag to generate practical surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) substrates. The Ag replicas of butterfly scales with higher structural periodicity are able to detect rhodamine 6G at a low concentration down to 10(-9) M, which i...