There is a great worldwide interest in plasmonic phenomena due to their very wide range of possible applications due to their electro-optical, thermal and optomechanical properties. Applications may include nonlinear optics, fluorescence enhancement, photocatalysis, chemical sensors, photovoltaic cells, plasmonic lasers, and medicine. Excitation of surface plasmon polaritons is quite difficult. It is much simpler with localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR), which is excited in metal nanoparticles. A very large variety of plasmonic metal nanoparticles are currently being studied. Usually, plasmonic nanoparticles are prepared from Au, Ag or Cu. Recently, there has been an increasing interest in the applications of Al nanoparticles in plasmonics. In addition to these, less popular metals such as Pd, Ru, Rh, Pt or 2D materials (graphene) are also being studied. Different metal nanoparticles have a different operating range, stability, synthesis possibilities, ultrafast LSPR relaxation properties. All this leads to the different potential of their use. Because there are so many variations in different properties of plasmonic nanoparticles to compare different nanoparticles with each other can be done in terms of metals, preparation methodology, structure, sizes, and their dispersion, it is an important task to select the most suitable nanoparticles for electro-optical applications. Most of the mentioned applications of plasmonic nanoparticles depend on the relaxation characteristics of LSPR. For some applications, faster LSPR relaxation is better, for others, slower. Ultra-fast transient absorption spectroscopy is the most suitable method for studying the relaxation dynamics of LSPR. During the practice, plasmon nanoparticles prepared by the method of chemical syntheses and by other techniques will be studied. The LSPR relaxation times of metal nanoparticles will be compared and their possible practical applications will be evaluated. The obtained results will be described in detail in the project’s scientific report.
Project funding:
Project is funded by EU Structural Funds according to the 2014–2020 Operational Programme for the European Union Funds’ Investments priority “Development of scientific competence of researchers, other researchers, students through practical scientific activities” under Measure No. 09.3.3-LMT-K-712.
Project results:
During the practice, silver nanoparticles of various sizes prepared by the wet chemical synthesis method and silver, gold and copper nanoparticles synthesized by laser ablation in liquid technique were studied in detail using a transient absorption spectrometer. It has been determined how the plasmonic properties of silver nanoparticles made by chemical synthesis change as their sizes changes. Plasmonic properties of silver, gold and copper nanoparticles synthesized by laser ablation in the liquid method were compared.
Period of project implementation: 2020-11-03 - 2021-04-30
Project coordinator: Kaunas University of Technology
