Broadband plasmonic nanoparticles: fabrication, optical properties, and implications in liquid light chemiluminescence enhancement

Abstract

Chemiphores are entities, which exhibit wide-band light emission without any external light source but just due to the chemical reaction resulting in the chemiluminescence effect. Since the chemiphores usually have low quantum efficiency, chemiluminescence is a weak optical effect. We found that plasmonic nanoparticles can efficiently enhance the peculiar effect of chemiluminescence due to the acceleration of the radiative decay of the chemiphore excited state which, in turn, enlarges the chemiluminescence yield. Correspondingly, plasmonic nanoparticles are nanoparticles with sub-wavelength sizes experiencing the absorption band in specific wavelength which are characterized by unique optical properties, as well as high localization of electromagnetic radiation. However, the broadband properties of plasmonic nanoparticles and their implications in liquid light, the chemiluminescence effect, is overlooked. Therefore, they can attract attention as novel materials for photonics, sensing, and forensic science. Here, fabrication techniques of broadband plasmonic nanoparticles are reported, and their interesting optical properties together with their applications in chemiluminescence effect are discussed, as well. We fabricated the nanoparticles with laser ablation in liquids (LAL) technique and propose the physical vapor deposition (PVD) synthesis with annealing-assisted treatment for further studies. Both techniques are accessible and allow production of ensembles of nanoparticles having shape and size distributions to exhibit broad plasmonic resonance which fit the wide-band emission of a chemiphore. Our results, in particular, a specific design for plasmonic nanoparticles placed on the dielectric material, lead the way toward a new generation of chemiluminescence-based devices starting from sensing, healthcare, biomedical research and quantum systems such as pump-free laser sources.