Large‐Area Fabrication of Periodic Arrays of Nanoholes in Metal Films and Their Application in Biosensing and Plasmonic‐Enhanced Photovoltaics

Abstract

Plasmonics is a fast developing research area with a great potential for practical applications. However, the implementation of plasmonic devices requires low cost methodologies for the fabrication of organized metallic nanostructures that covers a relative large area (∼1 cm2). Here the patterning of periodic arrays of nanoholes (PANHs) in gold films by using a combination of interference lithography, metal deposition, and lift off is reported. The setup allows the fabrication of periodic nanostructures with hole diameters ranging from 110 to 1000 nm, for 450 and 1800 nm of periodicity, respectively. The large areas plasmonic substrates consist of 2 cm × 2 cm gold films homogeneously covered by nanoholes and gold films patterned with a regular microarray of 200 μm diameter circular patches of PANHs. The microarray format is used for surface plasmon resonance (SPR) imaging and its potential for applications in multiplex biosensing is demonstrated. The gold films homogeneously covered by nanoholes are useful as electrodes in a thin layer organic photovoltaic. This is first example of a large area plasmonic solar cell with organized nanostructures. The fabrication approach reported here is a good candidate for the industrial‐scale production of metallic substrates for plasmonic applications in photovoltaics and biosensing.

Nanoplasmonics: a frontier of photovoltaic solar cells

“…The diameter and periodicity of the hole and the thickness of the metal fi lm can be well controlled to achieve optimized plasmonic resonance. A photocurrent enhancement has been demonstrated in polymer solar cells [127] .…”

Dual Color Plasmonic Pixels Create a Polarization Controlled Nano Color Palette

“…It is already well established that in such circumstances the plasmon tunnels through the aperture and decays to radiant photons upon penetrating the metal film. [19][20][21][22][23][24] By varying the size, shape, thickness and periodicity of the array, it is known that the permitted plasmon coupling frequency can be tuned, dictating the color of the transmitted light. 15,17,25,26 Typically, plasmonic cavity-aperture filters are comprised of circular nano-holes tuned to operate efficiently at a single wavelength.…”

Large area periodic, systematically changing, multishape nanostructures by laser interference lithography and cell response to these topographies

“…13,29,30 The localized surface plasmon resonances (LSPR) of these metallic arrays are a function of material, size, shape, spacing and periodicity of the structures. The size and the spacing of the structures could be adjusted by fine tuning the exposure times and the exposure angle.…”

“…11,12 Most researchers using Lloyd's systems have focused on creating uniform patterns over large areas. 13,14 However, for some studies, especially the those in the early device development stage, where systematic variation of parameters is necessary, fabrication of a variety of multiple and/or gradually changing structures on a single substrate is the desired goal. A typical example is the study of the influence of surface topographies in a systematic fashion in the field of cell biology, where the objective is to examine how cells respond to lines, broken lines and dots or combinations of them on microscopic to nanoscopic scales.…”