Versatile Micropatterning of Plasmonic Nanostructures by Visible Light Induced Electroless Silver Plating on Gold Nanoseeds.

A versatile fabrication technique for plasmonic silver (Ag) nanostructures that uses visible light exposure for micropatterning and plasmon resonance tuning is presented. The surface of a glass substrate modified with gold (Au) nanoseeds by a thermal dewetting process was used as a Ag plating platform. When a solution containing silver nitrate and sodium citrate was dropped on the Au nanoseeds under visible light exposure, the plasmon-mediated reduction of Ag ions was induced on the Au nanoseeds to form Ag nanostructures.