Surface plasmons on nanostructures

Title: Surface plasmons on nanostructures Author: Pavel Kvasnička Department: Department of Optics and Optoelectronics Supervisor: Jiří Homola, PhD, Institute of Photonics and Electronics, Chaberská 57, 182 57 Prague 8 Supervisor's e-mail address: homola@ufe.cz Abstract: An introduction to the field of (bio)sensors based on localized surface plasmons (LSP) on metallic nanoparticles is given. Description of theoretical ap- proaches to modeling of localized surface plasmons on nanoparticles and nanostruc- tures is given. These techniques are used to study the process of optical excitation of localized surface plasmons on individual metallic nanoparticles and to detemine main performance characteristics of LSP-based sensors. Experimental study of LSP on spherical nanoparticles is reported. It is demonstrated that metallic nanoparticles supporting LSP can be used to detect changes in the refractive index or molecular binding events. Keywords: surface plasmon, nanoparticles, surface plasmon resonance sensor