Efficient, designable, and broad-bandwidth optical extinction via aspect-ratio-tailored silver nanodisks

TL;DR

This paper presents a computational and experimental approach to designing silver nanodisks that achieve broad-band optical extinction with high efficiency, surpassing common nanostructures and approaching fundamental scattering limits.

Contribution

It introduces a method for tailoring nanodisk aspect ratios to maximize broadband optical extinction, combining computational design with experimental validation.

Findings

Nanodisks outperform common structures in light absorption and scattering.

Broadband extinction closely matches theoretical predictions.

Nanodisks approach fundamental limits to broadband scattering.

Abstract

Subwavelength resonators, ranging from single atoms to metallic nanoparticles, typically exhibit a narrow-bandwidth response to optical excitations. We computationally design and experimentally synthesize tailored distributions of silver nanodisks to extinguish light over broad and varied frequency windows. We show that metallic nanodisks are two-to-ten-times more efficient in absorbing and scattering light than common structures, and can approach fundamental limits to broadband scattering for subwavelength particles. We measure broadband extinction per volume that closely approaches theoretical predictions over three representative visible-range wavelength windows, confirming the high efficiency of nanodisks and demonstrating the collective power of computational design and experimental precision for developing new photonics technologies.