SPIE - Education Nanoplasmonics SC727

Nanooptics deals with optical phenomena and spectroscopy on the nanoscale, i.e., in the regions of space whose size is much smaller than the light wavelength. While electromagnetic waves cannot be localized in the regions with sizes significantly less than half wavelength, nanooptics is based on electric fields oscillating at optical frequency. From the positions of the interaction with matter and spectroscopy, such local optical fields mostly produce the same type of responses as electromagnetic waves. Elementary excitations that are carriers of energy and coherence in nanooptics are surface plasmons (SPs). These local fields cause a wealth of gigantically enhanced optical phenomena of which the surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) is the most studied and widely known. This one-day course will encompass the fundamental properties and applications of the surface plasmonics at the nanoscale. It will include coherent effects associated with phase memory of the SPs, in particular, coherent control of nanooptical phenomena. Nonlinear processes such as generation of harmonics and two-photon excitation by nanoscale fields will also be covered. Ultrafast (femtosecond and attosecond) phenomena are within the scope of this course. We will also include quantum phenomena associated with properties of surface plasmons as quantum quasiparticles such as quantum generation and fluctuations. Along with fundamental properties of SPs, we will consider many applications of nanoplasmonics, in particular, detection of ultrasmall amounts of chemical and biological compounds, scanning near-field optical microscopes or SNOMs, and nanolithography.