Fabrication and nanoengineering of metal-glass nanocomposites

The red and yellow colours of many medieval church windows originated from silver, gold and copper nanoparticles embedded in the window glass. The first evidence of using gold nanoparticles in antiquity dates back to the 4th century AD (the Lycurgus Cup). The physics of the processes remained a mystery until Michael Faraday, the well-known 19th century physicist, discovered that this effect is due to a new type of optical absorption in metal particles with dimensions substantially less than the wavelength of light. When a metal particle is smaller than the wavelength of light, the light reflected from it is replaced by light scattering, which is particularly strong at the resonance frequencies of collective electron excitations in the particle. These oscillations are known as the particle’s plasmons or surface plasmon resonances (SPRs). Glasses containing embedded metallic nanoparticles (metal-glass nanocomposites) exhibit peculiar linear and non-linear optical properties, mainly due to the SPRs of the metallic inclusions. The nanoparticles’ shapes and spatial distribution, predominantly and characteristically, determine polarisation dependence and spectral positions of the SPRs in the visible and near infrared. The main focus of this talk is on the interaction of (short and ultra-short) laser pulses as well as DC electric field with silver nanoparticles embedded in soda-lime glass, the resulting structural modifications and their emerging applications.