title: Origin of the Avalanche-Like Photoluminescence from Metallic Nanowires.
abstract: Surface plasmonic systems provide extremely efficient ways to modulate light-matter interaction in photon emission, light harvesting, energy conversion and transferring, etc. Various surface plasmon enhanced luminescent behaviors have been observed and investigated in these systems. But the origin of an avalanche-like photoluminescence, which was firstly reported in 2007 from Au and subsequently from Ag nanowire arrays/monomers, is still not clear. Here we show, based on systematic investigations including the excitation power/time related photoluminescent measurements as well as calculations, that this avalanche-like photoluminescence is in fact a result of surface plasmon assisted thermal radiation. Nearly all of the related observations could be perfectly interpreted with this concept. Our finding is crucial for understanding the surface plasmon mediated thermal and photoemission behaviors in plasmonic structures, which is of great importance in designing functional plasmonic devices.
authors.affiliation: Wuhan National High Magnetic Field Center and School of Physics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China.
authors.forename: Zongwei
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.affiliation: School of Physics, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China.
authors.forename: Ying
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Yu
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Xiamen University, Xiamen 361005, China.
authors.forename: Shaoxin
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Shen
authors.affiliation: Wuhan National High Magnetic Field Center and School of Physics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China.
authors.forename: Hongwei
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Dai
authors.affiliation: Wuhan National High Magnetic Field Center and School of Physics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China.
authors.forename: Linhua
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Yao
authors.affiliation: Wuhan National High Magnetic Field Center and School of Physics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China.
authors.forename: Yibo
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Han
authors.affiliation: Wenhua College, Wuhan 430074, China.
authors.forename: Xia
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Wuhan National High Magnetic Field Center and School of Physics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China.
authors.forename: Jun-Bo
authors.initials: JB
authors.lastname: Han
authors.affiliation: Wuhan National High Magnetic Field Center and School of Physics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China.
authors.forename: Liang
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Li