Ultrashortpuls laser system for coupling to a near-field optical microscope

用于耦合近场光学显微镜的超短脉冲激光系统

• 批准号: 431629254
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU)
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Major Research Instrumentation
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2018-12-31 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/431629254?language=en
• 关键词: Ultrashortpuls; laser; system; coupling; near

For our research in the area of nanophotonics, particularly for studies in the spectral regime of the near- and mid-infrared, we are in need of a flexible and widely tunable laser source with a time resolution of hundreds of femtoseconds. We will couple this light source to an already existing scattering-type near-field optical microscope, in order to study photonic surface waves over a wide spectral regime, from the visible to wavelengths of about 15 microns. A particular focus of this research will lie on polaritons, set up via the coupling of infrared radiation to the oscillations of phonons in nanostructured dielectric substrates. Additional areas of study are surface-enhanced molecular spectroscopies and chemical energy conversion caused by hot electrons excited in infrared-active plasmonic materials such as ZrN and TiN. Via coupling of the laser beam to the near-field optical microscope, we will be able to perform experiments with a spatial resolution of only a few nanometres. This will enable fundamental research work on the localization of infrared radiation into minute areas far below the diffraction limit, with applications in molecular spectrosocpy, imaging, and energy conversion. The preferred system offers additional possibilities such as pump/probe ultrashort pulse spectroscopy and a very high tunability range from 720 nm to 16 microns wavelength.

对于我们在纳米光子学领域的研究，特别是在近红外和中红外光谱区的研究，我们需要一个灵活的和广泛可调谐的激光源，具有数百飞秒的时间分辨率。我们将把这个光源耦合到一个已经存在的散射型近场光学显微镜，以研究光子表面波在宽光谱范围内，从可见光到波长约15微米。这项研究的一个特别的重点将在于极化激元，通过耦合的红外辐射的声子在纳米结构的电介质基板的振荡。其他研究领域是表面增强分子光谱和由红外活性等离子体材料（如ZrN和TiN）中激发的热电子引起的化学能量转换。通过将激光束耦合到近场光学显微镜，我们将能够进行空间分辨率仅为几纳米的实验。这将使基础研究工作的本地化红外辐射到微小的领域远低于衍射极限，在分子光谱学，成像和能量转换的应用。优选的系统提供了额外的可能性，例如泵浦/探测超短脉冲光谱和从720 nm到16微米波长的非常高的可调谐范围。