Fundamental limits to extinction by metallic nanoparticles.
We show that there are shape-independent upper bounds to the extinction cross section per unit volume of dilute, randomly arranged nanoparticles, given only material permittivity. Underlying the limits are restrictive sum rules that constrain the distribution of quasistatic eigenvalues. Surprisingly, optimally designed spheroids, with only a single quasistatic degree of freedom, reach the upper bounds for four permittivity values. Away from these permittivities, we demonstrate computationally optimized structures that surpass spheroids and approach the fundamental limits.
Department of Mathematics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
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Miller
Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA and Department of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA.
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Hsu
Department of Mathematics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
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Reid
Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
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Qiu
U.S. Army Edgewood Chemical Biological Center, Research and Technology Directorate, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland 21010, USA.
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DeLacy
Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
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Joannopoulos
Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
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Soljačić
Department of Mathematics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
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Johnson
D053768:Metal Nanoparticles / Q000737:chemistry*; D008956:Models, Chemical