Abstract

A large variety of applications ranging from plasmonic sensingto plasmonic enhanced solar cells, photonics, and optics can benefit from areliable method to enhance chemical and time stability of silver-basedplasmonic nanostructures and metamaterials. Therefore, here we demonstrateand discuss the effectiveness of a low-temperature (100 °C) hydrogen atomprocessing of silver to inhibit its oxidation and stabilize surface plasmonresonances in silver nanostructure suitable for plasmonics, metamaterials,sensing, and photovoltaics. Interestingly, no dielectric overlayer encapsulatingAg is used to protect the silver nanostructure, differently from the commonapproach, because these overlayers typically lead to a red shift of the opticalresonances due to their refractive index. Conversely, we demonstrate that thesilver deoxidation by the hydrogen treatment results in a slight blue shift ofresonances, which is useful for preserving resonances in the visible range. Thechemical mechanism rationalizing the validity of this processing is discussed. The optical properties of the fabricated sampleswere measured by means of transmission, reflection, and ellipsometry spectroscopies. Theoretical support to the interpretation ofthe optical properties demonstrates the advantages of this advanced processing. Therefore, this work is an important step towardnovel and breakthrough applications of stable silver-based nanostructures for plasmonics and metamaterials exploiting visiblelight.

Autore Pugliese

• Bianco Giuseppe Valerio , Losurdo Maria , Giangregorio Maria Michela

Tutti gli autori

• M. Losurdo; I. Bergmair; M.M. Giangregorio; K. Hingerl; G. Bruno; B. Dastmalki; G.V. Bianco; C. Helgert; E. Pshenay-Severin; M. Falkner; T. Pertsch; E. Kley; M. Verschuuren; M. Mühlberger; U. Huebner

Titolo volume/Rivista

Journal of physical chemistry. C

Anno di pubblicazione

2012

ISSN

1932-7447

ISBN

Non Disponibile

Numero di citazioni Wos

Nessuna citazione

Ultimo Aggiornamento Citazioni

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Numero di citazioni Scopus

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Ultimo Aggiornamento Citazioni

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Settori ERC

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Codici ASJC

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