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Sprinkled Silver Nanocubes Make Super Light Absorbers

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Microscopic silver cubes, when sprinkled at random on a polymer-coated gold surface, can provide a simple and tunable way to create large-area absorbers that “perfectly” absorb light of a given wavelength.

The ability to absorb light efficiently and over a desired wavelength range is essential for many photonic applications. Ideal, “perfect” absorbers of infrared or visible light have been made using lithography to create patterned structures on metallic surfaces. But such an approach is expensive and difficult to scale up to the large surface areas required for many applications.

Metallic nanocubes, developed at Duke University, provide a simple way to create a material that “perfectly” absorbs light of a given wavelength when sprinkled at random on a polymer-coated gold surface.
Metallic nanocubes, developed at Duke University, provide a simple way to create a material that “perfectly” absorbs light of a given wavelength when sprinkled at random on a polymer-coated gold surface. Courtesy of Cristian Ciracì.

David Smith and colleagues at Duke University have developed a simple chemical synthesis method, using a dusting of silver nanocubes to modify the absorptive properties of a metallic surface. When separated from the underlying metal by a very thin insulating layer, the cubes act as tiny antennas that cancel out the reflectance of the metal surface. The cost-effective absorbers could find use in applications ranging from sensors to energy-harvesting devices.

“Our new approach is more of a bottom-up process,” said Cristian Ciracì, a research scientist at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering. “It may allow us to create devices — such as efficient solar panels — that cover much larger areas. In our experiments, we demonstrated an extraordinarily simple method to achieve this.”

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The results, published in Nature (doi: 10.1038/nature11615), were conducted in Smith’s lab. He is a senior researcher and the William Bevan Professor of electrical and computer engineering.

The key for many applications or devices is the material’s ability to control the absorption of electromagnetic waves. Metals, for example, can be highly reflective on their own, which can benefit some applications, but for something like a solar cell, optimal light absorption is desired.

“Metamaterials based on metallic elements are particularly efficient as absorbers because both the electrical and magnetic properties of the material can be controlled by how we design them,” Ciracì said.

Duke’s metamaterial has three major components — a thin layer of gold film coated with a nanothin layer of an insulator, topped off with a dusting of millions of self-assembled nanocubes. The nanocubes used in the experiments were made of silver.

“The nanocubes are literally scattered on the gold film, and we can control the properties of the material by varying the geometry of the construct,” Ciracì said. “The absorptivity of large surface areas can now be controlled using this method at scales out of reach of lithography.”

Ciracì believes that, by combining different components of the metamaterial elements into a single composite, more complicated reflectance spectra could be engineered, and a “level of control needed in more exotic applications, such as dynamic inks,” could be achieved.

For more information, visit: www.duke.edu 

Published: December 2012
Glossary
lithography
Lithography is a key process used in microfabrication and semiconductor manufacturing to create intricate patterns on the surface of substrates, typically silicon wafers. It involves the transfer of a desired pattern onto a photosensitive material called a resist, which is coated onto the substrate. The resist is then selectively exposed to light or other radiation using a mask or reticle that contains the pattern of interest. The lithography process can be broadly categorized into several...
nano
An SI prefix meaning one billionth (10-9). Nano can also be used to indicate the study of atoms, molecules and other structures and particles on the nanometer scale. Nano-optics (also referred to as nanophotonics), for example, is the study of how light and light-matter interactions behave on the nanometer scale. See nanophotonics.
photonics
The technology of generating and harnessing light and other forms of radiant energy whose quantum unit is the photon. The science includes light emission, transmission, deflection, amplification and detection by optical components and instruments, lasers and other light sources, fiber optics, electro-optical instrumentation, related hardware and electronics, and sophisticated systems. The range of applications of photonics extends from energy generation to detection to communications and...
Americasantennachemical synthesisCristian CiracìDavid SmithDuke Universitydynamic inksenergyenergy harvestinggold surfacegreen photonicsImagingindustriallarge-area absorberslight absorberlithographymetallic surfacemetamaterialsnanonanothin insulatorNorth Carolinaphotonicsreflective propertiesResearch & Technologyself-assembled nanocubesSensors & Detectorssilver nanocubessolar panels

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