Abstract
Even though gold nanorod doped dielectrics have been widely used for optical laser writing and patterning there has been no attempt to study the dynamic range of these nanocomposites, let alone exploring ways to improve this property. Here we study the dynamic range of a gold nanorod doped polyvinyl alcohol film for various laser spot sizes at two different laser pulse repetition rates and show that when a high repetition rate laser source is employed the dynamic range of the nanocomposite is severely limited due to accumulative heating inside the focal volume. This problem could be solved by silica-coating the nanorods inside the polymer matrix. This method does not compromise the high repetition rate of the laser writing source and yet retains the attractive flexible properties of the polymer matrix. The silica-coated gold nanorod doped polymer nanocomposite could be an attractive medium for future high-speed, high repetition rate pulsed laser writing and patterning applications.
Highlights
Metallic nanorods have received much attention because of their anisotropic surface plasmon resonance featuring a large, polarization dependent absorption cross section which can be tuned throughout the visible wavelength range [1]
We show that this limited dynamic range can be improved up to 70% by silica coating of the gold nanorods, without compromising the high pulse repetition rate of the laser source
We studied the dynamic range of a gold nanorod doped polyvinyl alcohol film for various laser spot sizes at two different laser pulse repetition rates and showed that when a high repetition rate laser source is employed the dynamic range of the nanocomposite is limited due to accumulative heating inside the focal volume
Summary
Metallic nanorods have received much attention because of their anisotropic surface plasmon resonance featuring a large, polarization dependent absorption cross section which can be tuned throughout the visible wavelength range [1]. Even though gold nanorod doped dielectrics have been under intense investigation [2, 3, 4, 5] there has been no attempt to study the dynamic range of these nanocomposites, let alone exploring ways to improve this property imperative to patterning applications While a polymer such as polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) is an attractive matrix because of its mechanical properties and ease in doping, its low Tg and softness compared to other dielectric materials warrants a low damage threshold and dynamic range. Received 5 Jul 2007; revised 27 Aug 2007; accepted 27 Aug 2007; published 10 Sep 2007 17 September 2007 / Vol 15, No 19 / OPTICS EXPRESS 12152 We study both experimentally and theoretically the laser writing dynamic range of a gold nanorod doped PVA film for various laser spot sizes at two different laser pulse repetition rates.
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