Optical characterization of plasmonic metallic nanostructures fabricated by high-resolution lithography

Highly homogeneous arrays of Ag, Au and Cu nanorods were fabricated on glass substrates using electron-beam lithography and lift-off techniques. Optical properties of the fabricated structures related to localized surface plasmons (LSP), and their dependencies on the nanorod size were studied experimentally by optical extinction spectroscopy. Spectral tuning of LSP resonant scattering bands in a wide spectral range, from visible to near-infrared wavelengths, can be accomplished by tailoring of the nanorod dimensions, aspect ratios, and heights. The observed results qualitatively agree with Gans theory and numerical modeling by finite-difference time-domain technique.