Paper
28 September 2007 Particle enhanced plasmonic NSOM
Yuan Wang, Björn M. Reinhard, Cheng Sun, Xiang Zhang
Author Affiliations +
Abstract
Nearfield scanning optical microscopy (NSOM) offers a practical means of optical imaging at a resolution well beyond the diffraction limit of the light. However, its applications are limited due to the strong attenuation of the light transmitted through the sub-wavelength aperture. In this paper, we report the development of particle enhanced plasmonic nearfield scanning optical microscope (PEP-NSOM) with a high optical coupling efficiency and a high spatial resolution. Two plasmonic components, a gold nanoparticle and a plasmonic lens, are integrated on a PEP-NSOM probe. By exciting both propagating surface plasmons and localized surface plasmons, PEP-NSOM probes are capable of focusing light onto the nanoparticle assembled on the aperture of the plasmonic lens, which can further squeeze the light to a few tens of nanometers. Nearfield intensity at the focus points of PEP-NSOM probes is 590 times higher than that of incident light according to numerical simulations. The E-field profile is also shown to be confined laterally <50nm at the imaging plane, which promises good nearfield images with high spatial resolution and low signal-noise ratio. Investigation indicates the local intensity enhancement can be further increased to be 4830 when using a gold nanodimer on the PEP-NSOM probe, which suggests the PEP-NSOM to be an open system of utilizing plasmonic nanostructures for nano-imaging. By providing a strong nano-scale light source, PEP-NSOM can be used as a high speed nano-scale imaging tool for single molecule detection and many other applications requiring high temporal/spatial resolution.
© (2007) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Yuan Wang, Björn M. Reinhard, Cheng Sun, and Xiang Zhang "Particle enhanced plasmonic NSOM", Proc. SPIE 6642, Plasmonics: Nanoimaging, Nanofabrication, and Their Applications III, 664208 (28 September 2007); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.735466
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Cited by 1 scholarly publication.
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KEYWORDS
Plasmonics

Particles

Near field scanning optical microscopy

Nanoparticles

Surface plasmons

Image resolution

Gold

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