Development of a plasmon resonance enhanced optical trap for characterisation of single metal nanoparticle

The goal of this thesis is to develop an experimental method for constructing a plasmon resonance based gold nanorod trapping platform and suggest methods for characterizing a trapped single nanoparticle. While there are published methods that emphasize on building up an optical trapping setup or trap single gold nanorod using high power lasers, none were found that suggests on constructing a plasmon resonance based optical trapping setup which has the sole purpose of tweezing and characterizing a particular species (aspect ratio) of gold nanorod. Theoretical aspects of plasmon resonance and their contribution in trapping of gold nanorod is studied in detail. Characterisation properties discussed in this thesis include trapping strength, pattern of backscattered light and extinction spectrum. The necessary theories and corresponding equations for trapping force and extinction spectrum estimation are presented including all the assumptions and constraints that were applied. Moreover, the results from these characterisation methods are analysed in order to differentiate between a trapped gold nanorod and a dielectric microsphere. Matlab and LabView codes used in the characterisation experiments are presented at the end of the thesis as attached m-files and vi-files, respectively.

Name thesis:degree_name

M.S.

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Mechanical Engineering

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2012

Author dc:creator

• Zaman, Mehdi

Contributors dc:contributor

• Toussaint, Kimani C.

• optical tweezers
• optical trapping
• plasmon resonance
• stiffness measurement

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2012 Mehdi Zaman

Language dc:language

en

Handle dc:identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/31956

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/31956