Sub-diffraction phase-contrast imaging of transparent nano-objects by plasmonic lens structure

We propose a specially designed plasmonic lens structure to succeed in realizing sub-diffraction phase-contrast imaging of transparent nano-objects. The nano-objects are embedded inside the insulator layer of the metal-insulator-metal (MIM) plasmonic structure and have a small refractive index diffe...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nanotechnology 2013-04, Vol.24 (13), p.135203-135203
Main Authors: Yao, Na, Wang, Changtao, Tao, Xing, Wang, Yanqin, Zhao, Zeyu, Luo, Xiangang
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Collective excitations (including excitons, polarons, plasmons and other charge-density excitations)
Condensed matter: electronic structure, electrical, magnetic, and optical properties
Cross-disciplinary physics: materials science
rheology
Electronic structure and electrical properties of surfaces, interfaces, thin films and low-dimensional structures
Equipment Design
Equipment Failure Analysis
Exact sciences and technology
Imaging
Insulators
Lenses
Materials science
Materials Testing - instrumentation
Nanocomposites
Nanocrystalline materials
Nanomaterials
Nanoparticles - ultrastructure
Nanoscale materials and structures: fabrication and characterization
Nanostructure
Nanowires
Optical properties and condensed-matter spectroscopy and other interactions of matter with particles and radiation
Optical properties of low-dimensional, mesoscopic, and nanoscale materials and structures
Physics
Plasmonics
Quantum wires
Refractometry - instrumentation
Surface and interface electron states
Surface Plasmon Resonance - instrumentation
Three dimensional
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Summary:We propose a specially designed plasmonic lens structure to succeed in realizing sub-diffraction phase-contrast imaging of transparent nano-objects. The nano-objects are embedded inside the insulator layer of the metal-insulator-metal (MIM) plasmonic structure and have a small refractive index difference with respect to the transparent insulator layer. The excited surface plasmons in the MIM structure help to greatly enhance scattered light from the nano-objects and effectively suppress the transmitted illumination light. A spatial resolution of about 64 nm and a minimum distinguishable refractive index difference down to 0.05 are numerically demonstrated. For sub-diffraction phase-contrast imaging of irregular three-dimensional (3D) nanowires and nanocylinders, the optimized MIM structure shows much better performance in comparison with that of a superlens.
ISSN:0957-4484
1361-6528
DOI:10.1088/0957-4484/24/13/135203