title: Plasmonic gold helices for the visible range fabricated by oxygen plasma purification of electron beam induced deposits.
abstract: Electron beam induced deposition (EBID) currently provides the only direct writing technique for truly three-dimensional nanostructures with geometrical features below 50 nm. Unfortunately, the depositions from metal-organic precursors suffer from a substantial carbon content. This hinders many applications, especially in plasmonics where the metallic nature of the geometric surfaces is mandatory. To overcome this problem a post-deposition treatment with oxygen plasma at room temperature was investigated for the purification of gold containing EBID structures. Upon plasma treatment, the structures experience a shrinkage in diameter of about 18 nm but entirely keep their initial shape. The proposed purification step results in a core-shell structure with the core consisting of mainly unaffected EBID material and a gold shell of about 20 nm in thickness. These purified structures are plasmonically active in the visible wavelength range as shown by dark field optical microscopy on helical nanostructures. Most notably, electromagnetic modeling of the corresponding scattering spectra verified that the thickness and quality of the resulting gold shell ensures an optical response equal to that of pure gold nanostructures.
authors.affiliation: Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie GmbH, Hahn-Meitner-Platz 1, 14109 Berlin, Germany. Christiansen Research Group, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light, Günther-Scharowsky-Str. 1, 91058 Erlangen, Germany.
authors.forename: Caspar
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Haverkamp
authors.forename: Katja
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Höflich
authors.forename: Sara
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Jäckle
authors.forename: Anna
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Manzoni
authors.forename: Silke
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Christiansen