Material analysis using laser-plasma driven luminescence spectroscopy

Abstract

In this work, we introduce the use of laser-plasma driven spectroscopy as alternative to classical methods for analyzing nanomaterials, nanocomposites, insulators and semiconductors. We demonstrate that our spectroscopy, based on an In-Air Plasma-Induced Luminescence (In-Air-PIL), allows one to obtain the same information as acquired by classical photoluminescence, cathodoluminescence or extinction spectroscopies with regard to characterizing the nanoparticle dimension and energy gap of nanocomposites or insulators. In particular, the plasma acts as a composite source generating electrons and photons, which allows inducing plasmonic resonances in specific metallic nanoparticles (like gold or silver) or luminescence emission from complex matrixes. To validate our results, we perform simultaneous analyses of photoluminescence, cathodoluminescence and extinction analysis on gold and silver nanoparticles, and compare the changes in energy levels of doped SiO2 and carbon nanotubes-polymer composites caused by the insertion of dopants.