Universal nature of collective plasmonic excitations in finite 1D carbon-based nanostructures

Abstract

We provide evidence of the plasmon resonances in a number of representative 1D finite carbon-based nanostructures using first-principle computational electronic spectroscopy studies. Our special purpose real-space/real-time all-electron time-dependent density-functional theory simulator can perform excited-states calculations to obtain correct frequencies for known optical transitions, and capture various nanoscopic effects including collective plasmon excitations. The presence of 1D plasmons is universally predicted by the various numerical experiments, which also demonstrate a phenomenon of resonance splitting. For the metallic carbon nanotubes under study, the plasmons are expected to be related to the Tomonaga–Luttinger plasmons of infinitely long 1D structures. In-depth quantitative understanding of such resonances which have not been clearly identified in experiments so far, would be invaluable for future generations of nano-photonic and nano-electronic devices that employ 1D conductors.