Electrochemically driven dynamic plasmonics

Yan Jin; Lin Zhou; Jie Liang; Jia Zhu

doi:10.1117/1.AP.3.4.044002

Advanced Photonics, Volume. 3, Issue 4, 044002(2021)

Electrochemically driven dynamic plasmonics

Yan Jin¹, Lin Zhou^1,2、*, Jie Liang¹, and Jia Zhu^1、*

¹Nanjing University, College of Engineering and Applied Sciences, National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures, Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Artificial Functional Materials, Nanjing, China

²Nanjing University, Key Laboratory of Intelligent Optical Sensing and Manipulation, Ministry of Education, Nanjing, China

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Figures & Tables(8)

Fig. 1. Overview of electrochemistry enabled dynamic plasmonics: (a)–(c) approaches to realize dynamic plasmonics and (d)–(f) applications of dynamic plasmonics. (a) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 32, Copyright 2016, American Chemical Society. (b), (d) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 56, Copyright 2015, American Chemical Society. (c), (e) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 57, Copyright 2019, American Association for the Advancement of Science. (f) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 58, Copyright 2018, National Academy of Sciences.

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Fig. 2. Structural transformation for dynamic plasmonics. (a) Schematic of Au/Ag nanodome arrays. (b) Simulation of two-dimensional reflection spectra as a function of Ag shell thickness. (c) Measured reflection spectra of the device after different electrodeposition times. (d) Schematic of the morphology evolution during lithium deposition at different applied currents: lithium particle growth and disorder lithium dendrite formation. (e) Simulation reflectance of two lithium morphologies: shifts of reflectance dip and suppressed reflectance intensity. (f) The scanning electron microscope (SEM) image of lithium particles. (g) The SEM image of lithium dendrites. (h) Schematic of selective lithium deposition transferring metal–insulator–metal to the semi-infinite metallic grating. (i) The corresponding calculated reflection spectra switching between MPR and SPP. (a)–(c) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 32, Copyright 2016, American Chemical Society. (d)–(g) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 58, Copyright 2018, National Academy of Sciences. (h), (i) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 59, Copyright 2020, Wiley-VCH GmbH.

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Fig. 3. Carrier-density modulation for dynamic plasmonics. (a) The SEM image of the colloidal silver particles. Inset is the transmission electron microscopy (TEM) image. (b) Absorption spectra of the silver solution at the open circuit potential of (a) $+ 0.15 V$ , (b) $- 0.6 V$ , and (c) $+ 0.15 V$ versus Ag/AgCl. (c) The position of the plasmon peak and number of electrons transferred of the colloidal silver surface as a function of potential. TEM images of (d) AZO and (e) ITO nanocrystals. The transmittance of (f) AZO and (g) ITO nanocrystals before (orange, dashed) and after 20,000 cycles (purple, solid) with voltage modulation. (h) The TEM image of 5% Nb-doped ${TiO}_{2}$ nanocrystals. (i) In situ spectroelectrochemistry of 5% Nb-doped ${TiO}_{2}$ films with four distinct optical states, with different transmittance of visible (yellow arrow) and infrared (red arrow) light. (a)–(c) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 81, Copyright 1997, American Chemical Society. (d)–(g) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 82, Copyright 2013, Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. (h), (i) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 56, Copyright 2015, American Chemical Society.

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Fig. 4. Electrochemically active surrounding-media manipulation for dynamic plasmonics. (a)–(d) Schematic, experimentally obtained reflectance spectra and FDTD simulated reflectance spectra of plasmochromic nanocavities based on a ${WO}_{3}$ insulator layer with lithium insertion. (e) Schematic of a PANI-coated Au nanoparticle on a metallic Au mirror and redox reaction of PANI ( ${PANI}^{0}$ , fully reduced; ${PANI}^{1 +}$ , half oxidized; ${PANI}^{2 +}$ , fully oxidized). (f) Scattering spectra and inset SEM image of a single PANI-coated Au nanoparticle ( $c_{0}$ , ${PANI}^{0}$ ; $c_{2 +}$ , ${PANI}^{2 +}$ ). (g) Reversible switching of coupled plasmon resonance wavelength versus the applied voltage. (a)–(d) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 37, Copyright 2020, American Chemical Society. (e)–(g) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 57, Copyright 2019, American Association for the Advancement of Science.

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Fig. 5. Applications of dynamic plasmonics: structural color displays. (a) Schematic of PANI-coated Au nanoparticles-based displays integrated with an electrochemical cell for scalable color generation. (b) Dark field images of Au nanoparticles with 20-, 40-, and 60-nm diameters during PANI redox reactions. (c) Color gamut (CIE 1931 chromaticity) of PANI-coated Au nanoparticles with 20-, 40-, and 60-nm diameters during PANI redox. (d) Device photo of PANI-coated Au nanoparticles before and after 3 months. Switching times of various plasmonic nanomaterials versus (e) the wavelength and (f) pixel areas. (a)–(f) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 57, Copyright 2019, American Association for the Advancement of Science.

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Fig. 6. Applications of dynamic plasmonics: chemical sensors. (a)–(d) Electrocatalysis reaction sensors: (a) schematic of dark-field microscopy integrated with an electrochemical workstation for chemical reaction sensors; (b) schematic of the electrocatalytic oxidation reaction mechanism of $H_{2} O_{2}$ on a single gold nanoparticle surface; (c) scattering spectra of a single gold nanoparticle ( $\sim 40 nm \times 65 nm$ ) during the cyclic scanning; (d) scattering peak shift of $40 nm \times 65 nm$ (I, III) and $40 nm \times 84 nm$ (II, IV) single gold nanoparticle with (I, II) and without (III, IV) 1 mM $H_{2} O_{2}$ in 0.10 M ${KNO}_{3}$ solution under the applied potential from $- 0.10$ to 1.00 V. (e)–(j) Battery sensors: (e)–(h) in operando reflectance during lithium metal (e), (g) deposition and (f), (h) stripping at two applied current densities: (e), (f) 0.03 mA and (g), (h) 1 mA. In situ lithium dendrite detection with (i) applied current and (j) in situ reflectance. (a)–(d) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 110, Copyright 2014, American Chemical Society. (e)–(j) Reproduced with permission from Ref. 58, Copyright 2018, National Academy of Sciences.

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Table 1. Summary of smart windows of various approaches.

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Table 1. Summary of smart windows of various approaches.


Material	${WO}_{3}$ ¹⁰²	Cu-Ag³⁴	Cu-Bi, NiO³⁵	ITO⁸²	AZO⁸²
Approach	Ion insertion	Electrochemical deposition	Electrochemical deposition and ion insertion	Capacitive charging	Capacitive charging
Mechanism	Polaronic absorption	Structural transformation	Structural transformation	Carrier-density change	Carrier-density change
Device area	—	$25 {cm}^{2}$	$100 {cm}^{2}$	$4 {cm}^{2}$	$4 {cm}^{2}$
Spectral range	VIS	400 to 1000 nm	VIS	NIR	NIR
$Δ T$	97.7% (633 nm)	75% (600 nm)	65% (600 nm)	25% (solar NIR)	40% (solar NIR)
Switch speed coloration/bleaching	6 s/2.7 s	$< 3 \min$	60 s	3.06 s/6.8 s 0.1 M ${LiCO}_{4} / PC$	1 s/1.8 s 0.1 M ${LiCO}_{4} / PC$
Coloration efficiency ( ${cm}^{2} C^{- 1}$ ) (for contrast ratio at a specific wavelength)	118.3 (for 97.7% at 633 nm)	90 (for 60% at 600 nm)	—	400 (for $\sim 60 %$ at 1800 nm)	450 (for $\sim 57 %$ at 2000 nm)
Cycling	300	5500	4000	20,000, 45% capacity decay	20,000, 11% capacity decay

Table 2. Summary of structural color displays of various approaches.

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Table 2. Summary of structural color displays of various approaches.


Structure	Au/Ag core shell nanodome³²	Au- ${WO}_{3}$ -Au nanohole cavities³⁷	PANI-coated Au nanoparticle on Au mirror⁵⁷	LC on Al nanowell²⁶
Approach	Electrochemical deposition	Li ion insertion into ${WO}_{3}$	Redox reaction of polymer	LCs orientation change
Mechanism	Structural transformation	Surrounding refractive index change	Surrounding refractive index change	Surrounding refractive index change
Spectral range/tunability	220-nm shift	64-nm shift	$> 100 - nm$ shift	95-nm shift
Reflectivity	60%	35%	$> 50 %$	50% to 80%
Speed	$< 1 s$	4 s	30 ms	Millisecond-scale
Resolution	—	$5 \times 10^{4} pixels / inch$	$> 10^{9} pixels / inch$	High
Angle independence	—	—	Yes	20 deg
Stability, retention	—	100 cycles, 88%	$> 3$ months	—
Energy consumption	—	$5.6 mW {cm}^{- 2}$	$0.3 mW {cm}^{- 2}$	—