Browsing by Author "Liu, Lifei"

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    Aluminum Nanocrystals
    (American Chemical Society, 2015) McClain, Michael J.; Schlather, Andrea E.; Ringe, Emilie; King, Nicholas S.; Liu, Lifei; Manjavacas, Alejandro; Knight, Mark W.; Kumar, Ish; Whitmire, Kenton; Everitt, Henry O.; Nordlander, Peter; Halas, Naomi J.; Bioengineering; Chemistry; Electrical and Computer Engineering; Materials Science and Nanoengineering; Physics and Astronomy; Laboratory for Nanophotonics
    We demonstrate the facile synthesis of high purity aluminum nanocrystals over a range of controlled sizes from 70 to 220 nm diameter with size control achieved through a simple modification of solvent ratios in the reaction solution. The monodisperse, icosahedral, and trigonal bipyramidal nanocrystals are air-stable for weeks, due to the formation of a 2-4 nm thick passivating oxide layer on their surfaces. We show that the nanocrystals support size-dependent ultraviolet and visible plasmon modes, providing a far more sustainable alternative to gold and silver nanoparticles currently in widespread use.
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    Plasmonic Properties of Aluminum Nanostructures
    (2015-02-13) Liu, Lifei; Nordlander, Peter J.; Halas, Naomi; Link, Stephan
    The plasmonic properties of metallic nanoscale systems have been widely investigated. However the plasmon resonances of the most common plasmonic materials, like gold and silver, are challenging to be tuned into the ultra-violet (UV) region due to their inherent limitations. Recently, aluminum has attracted increasing attention because its plasmon resonances can be extended from the whole visible spectrum into UV region. Also aluminum is a low-cost material of the compatibility to manufacturing process including complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS), which allows aluminum to serve as an alternative plasmonic material for commercial applications. In this thesis, measuring the scattering spectra of aluminum nanostructures has been performed, which confirms the tunability of aluminum plasmon resonances. We also directly image the local density of optical states (LDOS) of aluminum nanostructures. Furthermore, the dependence of aluminum plasmon resonances on oxide fractions within the system has been investigated. Finally we demonstrate the feasibility of a promising application of aluminum nanorods for plasmonic-based full-color display.