Berlin 2018 – scientific programme

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CPP: Fachverband Chemische Physik und Polymerphysik

CPP 29: Nanostructures, Nanostructuring and Nanosized Soft Matter I

CPP 29.2: Talk

Tuesday, March 13, 2018, 11:30–11:45, C 230

Plasmonic Broadband Absorbers for Hot Electrons Extraction — •Charlene Ng¹, Ann Roberts², Tim Davis², Daniel Gomez³, Tobias König¹, and Andreas Fery¹ — ¹Leibniz-Institut für Polymerforschung, Institiute of Physical Chemistry and Polymer Physics, Dresden, Germany — ²School of Physics, The University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia 3010 — ³RMIT University, Melbourne, VIC, 3000, Australia

Metallic nanostructures exhibit localized surface plasmon resonances (LSPR), a phenomenon where the confined electrons of the metal collectively oscillate in response to the interaction with light. Following the excitation of LSPRs, the energy flow out radiatively though re-emitted photons or non-radiatively by generating highly energetic hot electrons. When in contact with a semiconductor, plasmonic nanostructures can form a Schottky junction and could emit these hot electrons to the conduction band of semiconductor, where various photo-induced chemical reactions can be induced. Most importantly, the generation of these hot electrons usually requires photon energies that are much lower than the band gap energy of typical semiconductors, allowing visible or near infra-red light to be harnessed. This emerging approach for harvesting solar energy essentially opens up new strategies to achieve high performance photocatalytic devices. Essentially, the first step to achieve high conversion efficiencies is to maximise the light absorption of plasmonic metal nanostructures. In this work, different strategies to maximise the light absorption of plasmonic nanostructures and efficient extraction of hot electrons will be discussed.