Colloidal nanodisk shaped plexcitonic nanoparticles with large Rabi splitting energies

Abstract

When plasmons supported by metal nanoparticles interact strongly with molecular excitons or excitons of semiconducting quantum dots, plexcitons are formed in the strong coupling regime. The hybrid plexcitonic nanoparticles with a wide range of sizes and shapes have been synthesized by using wet chemistry methods or have been fabricated on solid substrates by using lithographic techniques. In order to deeply understand plasmon-exciton interaction at the nanoscale dimension and boost the performance of nanophotonic devices made of plexcitonic nanoparticles, new types of plexcitonic nanoparticles with tunable optical properties and outstanding stability at room temperature are urgently needed. Herein, we for the first time report pure colloidal nanodisk shaped plexcitonic nanoparticles with very large Rabi splitting energies, i.e., more than 350 meV. We synthesize silver nanoprisms by using seed mediated synthesis and then convert nanoprisms to nanodisks at a high temperature. Localized plasmon resonance of the silver nanodisk in the visible spectrum can be effectively tuned by heating. Subsequently, self-assembly of J-aggregate dyes on plasmonic nanodisks produces plexcitonic nanoparticles. We envision that colloidal nanodisk shaped plexcitonic nanoparticles with very large Rabi splitting energies and outstanding stability at room temperature will enlarge the application of plexcitonic nanoparticles in a variety of fields such as polariton laser, biosensor, plasmon molecular nanodevices, and energy flow at nanoscale dimensions.