Optical excitations and energy transfer in nanoparticle waveguides
- Statement of relevance
The proposed theoretical work would benefit the experimental researches on nanoparticle waveguides. These waveguides can be used to optically interconnect electronic devices, to detect biomolecules, in transducer and antenna applications and to form the double negative composite medium. The ability to compose the high quality nanoparticle waveguide by the widely used dielectric materials like ZnO or TiO2 will be investigated and the practical requirements to the particle size and relative placement will be found. Novel applications, including the micro-size mirror-less lasers with the low pump threshold, will be investigated.
- Objective of the research
The main objective of the present proposal is the comprehensive investigation of the high-quality optical modes formed within one-dimensional nanoparticle arrays. These modes can be formed in dielectric arrays when the interparticle distance becomes less than the half of the resonant wavelength. Theory should describe the criteria for the formation of such modes in widely used dielectric materials (ZnO, TiO2); investigate the mode quality dependence on the array geometry, particle size and disordering; analyze the guidance of the optical energy by those modes for various waveguide geometries and different mechanisms of a mode excitation. Novel applications employing the nanoparticle arrays will be investigated including lasers and other possible systems of interest. Nanoparticle arrays composed by dielectric spheres and rods will be both considered.
- Approach
The work will be performed combining previously developed analytical and numerical methods. The frequency domain analysis of an electromagnetic field within the array of the spheres will be made using the amplitude scattering matrix formalism extending the Mie theory to the multisphere case. The analytical investigation will be performed for the regular arrays of linear, circular and possibly planar shapes using the exact Fourier transform of the spherical vector functions. The numerical investigation of the optical quality for the disordered arrays of particles, having the finite size, will be performed using the generalization of the iterative diagonalization procedure suggested in the previous PI’s work. The mode excitation and optical energy transfer will be studied for different nanoparticle arrays including the T-shape connectors of different arrays to split the energy current and O-shaped connectors to employ the interference.
- Scientific merit
The recent development of the technology makes it possible to create highly ordered arrays of arbitrary shaped nano-particles. Low dimensional arrays (chains or planar layers) are of the special interest because of their easier design, small size, comparable or less than the optical wavelength and the formation of the guided polariton modes. Basic principles of the guided mode formation in nanoparticle arrays due to the light cone constraint are well understood, while the properties of these modes in realistic, possibly disordered, arrays are still unclear. This is because the existing approaches are restricted to oversimplified coupled dipole models and they cannot treat directly the optical mode quality. The accurate theory describing optical modes, based on the previous PI’s work on random lasers, will be developed for the nanoparticle arrays of interest.
Funding: Air Force Office of Scientific Research
The research has been performed using multisphere Mie scattering formalism. Our programming codes, written in Scilab to compute interaction between spheres and setup and solve equations for quasistates and transport of energy are available here. We are working on their improvement and translation to Matlab.
Collaborators
- Frederick D. Lewis (Northwestern University)
- George C. Schatz (Northwestern University)
- Michael Noginov (Norfolk State University)
- Alexey Yamilov (University of Missouri)
Related Publications
Recent
M. I. Gozman, I. Ya. Polishchuk, A. L. Burin, Light propagation in linear arrays of spherical particles, Physics Letters A 372, 5250–5253 (2008).
G. S. Blaustein, M. I. Gozman, I. Y. Polishchuk, A. L. Burin, Optical Modes in Linear Arrays of Dielectric Spherical Particles: A Numerical Investigation, Transparent Optical Network. 2007. ICTON ’07, 9th International Conference4, 136-139 (2007).
A. L. Burin, G. S. Blaustein, O. M. Samoylova, Bound Whispering Gallery modes in Arrays of Dielectric Spherical Particles, Invited Paper, Transparent Optical Network. 2007. ICTON ’07, 9th International Conference3, 71-74 (2007).
A. L. Burin, G. S. Blaustein, O. M. Samoylova, Bound Whispering Gallery modes in Circular Arrays of Dielectric Spherical Particles, Proceedings of SPIE 6452, Invited Paper, pp. 64520H-1 – 64520H-15 (2007).
G. S. Blaustein, A. L. Burin, Optical modes in linear arrays of dielectric spherical particles: A numerical investigation, Proc. of SPIE 6452, pp. 645212-1 – 645212-9 (2007).
A. L. Burin, Bound whispering gallery modes in circular arrays of dielectric spherical particles , Phys. Rev. E 73, 066614, 2006.
Earlier Significant Related Publications
A. Yamilov, X. Wu, H. Cao, A. L. Burin, Absorption-induced Confinement of Lasing Modes in Diffusive Random Medium, cond-mat/0504452, Optics Letters, v. 30, pp. 2430-2432, 2005.
A. Yamilov, S.-H. Chang, A. L. Burin, A. Taflove, H. Cao, Field and Intensity Correlations in Amplifying Random Media, Physical Review B, v. 71, No. 092201, 2005.
A. L. Burin, H. Cao, G. C. Schatz, M. A. Ratner, High Quality Optical Modes in Low-Dimensional Arrays of Nanoparticles: Application to Random Lasers, Journal of American Optical Society B, v. 21, No. 1, pp. 121-131, 2004.
M. A. Noginov, G. Zhu, S. Williams, A. L. Burin, Dependence of the NdSc3(BO3)4 random laser output parameters on the particle size, Quantum Electronics and Laser Science, 2003. QELS. Postconference Digest
H. Cao, J. Y. Xu, Y. Ling, A. L. Burin, E. W. Seelig, X. Liu, R. P. H. Chang, Random Lasers with Coherent Feedback, IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics (Invited Paper), v. 9, no. 1, pp. 111-120, 2003.
A. L. Burin, M. A. Ratner, H. Cao, Two Photon Pumping of Random Laser, IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics, v. 9, no. 1, pp. 124-127, 2003.
A. L. Burin, M. A. Ratner, H.Cao, R. P. H. Chang, Model of Random Laser, Physical Review Letters, v. 87, No. 215503, 2001.
Y. Ling, H. Cao, A. L. Burin, M. A. Ratner, E. Seelig, R. P. H. Chang, Investigation of Random Laser with Resonant Feedback, Physical Review A, v. 64, No. 063808, 2001.
