Large-scale fabrication of plasmonic gold nanohole arrays for refractive index sensing at visible region

We present the design and fabrication of large-scale gold nanohole arrays based on the versatile nanosphere lithography technique. The gold nanohole arrays exhibit two surface plasmonic resonance related transmission peaks and show a sensitive response to refractive index. The working wavelength and sensitivity can be tuned by changing the hole diameter and hole depth. A sensitivity of 125 nm/refractive index unit is obtained in the visible region. Our quasi-infinite gold nanohole arrays film can serve as an optical enhancing component while also can serve as a transparent conductive electrode for the opto-electric devices. (C) 2012 American Institute of Physics. [http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4728987]