Directional Light Extinction and Emission in a Metasurface of Tilted Plasmonic Nanopillars

Journal article, 2016

Plasmonic optical antennas and metamaterials with an ability to boost light-matter interactions for particular incidence or emission angles could find widespread use in solar harvesting, biophotonics, and in improving photon source performance at optical frequencies. However, directional plasmonic structures have generally large footprints or require complicated geometries and costly nano-fabrication technologies. Here, we present a directional metasurface realized by breaking the out-of-plane symmetry of its individual elements: tilted subwavelength plasmonic gold nanopillars. Directionality is caused by the complex charge oscillation induced in each individual nanopillar, which essentially acts as a tilted dipole above a dielectric interface. The metasurface is homogeneous over a macroscopic area and it is fabricated by a combination of facile colloidal lithography and off-normal metal deposition. Fluorescence excitation and emission from dye molecules deposited on the metasurface is enhanced in specific directions determined by the tilt angle of the nanopillars. We envisage that these directional metasurfaces can be used as cost-effective substrates for surface-enhanced spectroscopies and a variety of nanophotonic applications.