Plasmon-Enhanced Ultraviolet Luminescence in Colloid Solutions and Nanostructures Based on Aluminum and ZnO Nanoparticles.

Aluminum nanoparticles attract scientific interest as a promising low-cost material with strong plasmon resonance in the ultraviolet region, which can be used in various fields of photonics. In this paper, for the first time, ultraviolet luminescence of zinc oxide nanoparticles in colloid solutions and nanostructure films in the presence of plasmonic aluminum nanoparticles 60 nm in size with a metal core and an aluminum oxide shell were studied. Mixture colloids of ZnO and Al nanoparticles in isopropyl alcohol solution with concentrations from 0.

Engineering of the Photon Local Density of States: Strong Inhibition of Spontaneous Emission near the Resonant and High-Refractive Index Dielectric Nano-objects.

Metallic or dielectric nano-objects change the photon local density of states of closely placed emitters, particularly when plasmon or Mie resonances are present. Depending on the shape and material of these nano-objects, they may induce either a decrease or an increase in decay rates of the excited states of the emitter. In this work, we consider the reduction of the probability of optical transitions in emitters near high-refractive index dielectric (silicon and zinc selenide) nanoparticles.

Plasmon-enhanced fluorescence in gold nanorod-quantum dot coupled systems.

Plasmon-exciton coupling is of great importance to many optical devices and applications. One of the coupling manifestations is plasmon-enhanced fluorescence. Although this effect is demonstrated in numerous experimental and theoretical works, there are different particle shapes for which this effect is not fully investigated.

Possible nanoantenna control of chlorophyll dynamics for bioinspired photovoltaics.

In the context of using portions of a photosynthetic apparatus of green plants and photosynthesizing bacteria in bioinspired photovoltaic systems, we consider possible control of the chlorophyll excited state decay rate using nanoantennas in the form of a single metal and semiconductor nanoparticle. Since chlorophyll luminescence competes with electron delivery for chemical reactions chain and also to an external circuit, we examine possible excited state decay inhibition contrary to radiative rate enhancement. Both metal and semiconductor nanoparticles enable inhibition of radiative decay rate by one order of the magnitude as compared to that in vacuum, whereas a metal nanosphere cannot perform the overall decay inhibition since slowing down of radiative decay occurs only along with the similar growth of its nonradiative counterpart whereas a semiconductor nanoantenna is lossless.

Tuning spontaneous radiation of chiral molecules by asymmetric chiral nanoparticles.

We have obtained analytical expressions for the radiative decay rate of the spontaneous emission of a chiral molecule located near a dielectric spherical particle with a chiral nonconcentric spherical shell made of a bi-isotropic material. Our numerical and graphical analyses show that material composition, thickness and degree of non-concentricity of the shell can influence significantly the spontaneous radiation of the chiral molecule. In particular, the radiative decay rates can differ in orders of magnitude for a chiral molecule located near the thin and thick parts of a nonconcentric shell as well as near a concentric shell made of chiral metamaterial.

Nonresonant surface-enhanced Raman scattering of ZnO quantum dots with Au and Ag nanoparticles.

Pronounced 10(4)-fold enhancement of Raman scattering has been obtained for ZnO nanocrystals on substrates coated with 50 nm Ag nanoparticles under nonresonant excitation with a commercial red-emitting laser. This makes feasible beyond 10(-18) mole detection of ZnO nanocrystals with a commercial setup using a 0.1 mW continuous wave laser and can be purposefully used in analytical applications where conjugated nanocrystals serve as Raman markers.

Photoacoustic imaging of living mouse brain vasculature using hollow gold nanospheres.

Photoacoustic tomography (PAT) also referred to as optoacoustic tomography (OAT) is a hybrid imaging modality that employs nonionizing optical radiation and ultrasonic detection. Here, we describe the application of a new class of optical contrast agents based on mesoscopic hollow gold nanospheres (HAuNS) to PAT. HAuNS are approximately 40 nm in diameter with a hollow interior and consist of a thin gold wall.

Acoustic signals generated by laser-irradiated metal nanoparticles.

We present a physical model that explains several sequential stages of the conversion of optical to acoustical energy when irradiating diluted suspensions of metal nanoparticles with laser pulses. Optical absorption and scattering of a single particle driven by plasmon resonance interactions in an aqueous medium are considered. Thermal effects produced by laser-irradiated nanoparticles, dynamics of vapor bubble formation, and acoustic signals from expanding bubbles formed around heated nanoparticles are calculated.