Imaging Plasmons with Sub-2 nm Spatial Resolution via Tip-Enhanced Four-Wave Mixing

Tip-Enhanced Sum Frequency Generation for Molecular Vibrational Nanospectroscopy

Vibrational sum frequency generation (SFG) is a nonlinear spectroscopic technique widely used to study the molecular structure and dynamics of surface systems. However, the spatial resolution achieved by far-field observations is constrained by the diffraction limit, obscuring molecular details in inhomogeneous structures smaller than the wavelength of light. To overcome this limitation, we developed a system for tip-enhanced SFG (TE-SFG) spectroscopy based on a scanning tunneling microscope. We successfully detected vibrational TE-SFG signals from adsorbed molecules on a gold substrate under ambient conditions. The phase analysis of interferometric SFG spectra provided information on molecular orientation. Furthermore, the observed TE-SFG signal was confirmed to originate from a highly localized region within a gap between the tip apex and the sample substrate. This method offers a novel platform for nonlinear optical nanospectroscopy, paving the way for the investigation of surface molecular systems beyond the diffraction limit.

Broadband Tip-Enhanced Nonlinear Optical Response in a Plasmonic Nanocavity

We report a significantly broad nonlinear optical response enhanced in a tip-substrate plasmonic nanocavity. Focusing on the near-field second harmonics of the wavelength-tunable femtosecond laser, we demonstrate that the tip-enhancement of nonlinear optical effects efficiently works over the broad wavelength range through the visible to infrared region. We also found that this broadband nonlinear optical property is directly affected not only by the nanometer-scale sharpness of the tip apexes but also by the micrometer-scale surface geometry of the tip shafts. While spatially nonlocal plasmonic modes excited throughout the micrometer-scale tip shafts enhance near-to-mid-infrared incoming light, the radiation of visible-to-near-infrared second harmonics is boosted by localized plasmons at the nanogap. These two plasmonic modes simultaneously affect the excitation and emission processes, realizing the strong and broad enhancement of second harmonic generation. Our results provide a new basis for the physical understanding and fine manipulation of nonlinear optical phenomena enhanced in plasmonic nanocavities.

Resonant Coherent Raman Scattering from WSe2

Low-dimensional transition-metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) continue to comprise a subject of intense research because of their unique optical and electronic properties that may be harnessed in modern devices. Intense photoluminescence (PL) from few-/monolayer TMDs rendered PL-based micro- and nanospectroscopic characterization ideal in the quest to understand the correlation between structure and function in these materials. Nonlinear optical methods are by comparison far less utilized for this purpose. In this work, we describe an approach based on electronically resonant four-wave-mixing that allows spatio-spectral characterization of excitons in monolayer WSe₂. Due to the coherent nature of the response that we exploit to trace exciton resonances, and recent demonstrations of electronic four-wave-mixing-based nanoimaging and nanospectroscopy, our present work is an important step toward characterizing TMDs on the nano-femto scale using light.

Multimodal (Non)Linear Optical Nanoimaging and Nanospectroscopy

This Perspective highlights recent advances in linear and nonlinear spectral nanoimaging. The described developments are motivated by the need to characterize molecular and material systems noninvasively with nanometer spatial and femtosecond temporal resolution. Indeed, the ability to image and chemically characterize heterogeneous interfaces with joint nano-femto resolution is a prerequisite to advancing our fundamental understanding of processes as diverse as heterogeneous catalysis, microbial communication, and energy flow in pristine/defect-containing low-dimensional quantum materials, to name a few. We describe pioneering work and recent demonstrations of (non)linear optical nanoimaging and nanospectroscopy, with an emphasis on high spatial resolution measurements conducted under ambient laboratory conditions.

Tip-enhanced four-wave mixing internally illuminated by an ultrafast vector light field

A tip nanofocusing light field, with high electric-field intensity and nanoscale mode volume, can significantly improve nonlinear light scattering efficiency, thereby greatly promoting the development of strong-field nano-optics. Here, tip-enhanced four-wave mixing (FWM) is theoretically analyzed through two ultrafast radial vector beams internally illuminating an Ag-coated silica tip (ACST). Two femtosecond pulses, with radial electric vectors and pulse width of 100 fs, are adopted as excitation sources to illuminate the ACST. Degenerate tip-enhanced FWM (ω_FWM= 2ω₁-ω₂) with a nonlinear conversion efficiency of ∼10^-5 is achieved. The peak electric-field amplitude of the two pump pulses is 5 × 10⁷ V/m, which is two orders of magnitude lower than that of the external excitation method. Further theoretical analysis shows that the conversion efficiency of the tip-enhanced FWM has strict frequency detuning dependence characteristics, and is closely related to the frequency response of the tip nanofocusing light field. This plasmonic tip provides an approach for enhancing nonlinear nano-optics, and may be used in the field of tip-based FWM nanoscopy.

Tip-Enhanced Raman Scattering on Both Sides of the Schrödinger Equation

Historically, molecular spectroscopists have focused their attention to the right-hand side of the Schrödinger equation. Our major goal had and still has to do with determining a (bio)molecular system's Hamiltonian operator. From a theoretical spectroscopist's perspective, this entails varying the parameters of a model Hamiltonian until the predicted observables agree with their experimental analogues. In this context, less emphasis has been put on the left-hand side of the equation, where the interplay between a system and its immediate local environment is described. The latter is particularly meaningful and informative in modern applications of optical microscopy and spectroscopy that take advantage of surface plasmons to enhance molecular scattering cross-sections and to increase the attainable spatial resolution that is classically limited by diffraction. Indeed, the manipulation of light near the apex of a metallic nanotip has enabled single molecule detection, identification, and imaging. The distinct advantages of the so-called tip-enhanced optical nanospectroscopy/nanoimaging approaches are self-evident: ultrahigh spatial resolution (nanometer or better) and ultimate sensitivity (down to yoctomolar) are both attainable, all while retaining the ability to chemically fingerprint one molecule at a time (e.g., through Raman scattering). An equally interesting aspect of the same approach stems from using the properties of a single molecule to characterize the local environment in which it resides. This concept of single molecule spectroscopy on the left-hand side of the Schrödinger equation is certainly not novel and has been discussed in pioneering single molecule studies that ultimately led to a Nobel prize in chemistry. That said, local environment mapping through ultrasensitive optical spectroscopy acquires a unique flavor when executed using tip-enhanced Raman scattering (TERS). This is the subject of this Account.In a series of recent reports, our group utilized TERS to characterize different properties of nanolocalized and enhanced optical fields. The platforms that were used to this end consist of chemically functionalized plasmonic nanostructures and nanoparticles imaged using visible-light-irradiated gold- or silver-coated probes of an atomic force microscope. Through a detailed analysis of the recorded spectral nanoimages, we found that molecular Raman spectra may be used to track the magnitudes, resonances, spatiotemporal gradients, and even vector components of optical fields with nanometer spatial resolution under ambient conditions. On the other side of the equation, understanding how spatially varying optical fields modulate molecular nano-Raman spectra is of utmost importance to emerging areas of nanophotonics. For instance, tracking plasmon-enhanced chemical transformations via TERS necessitates a deeper fundamental understanding of the optical signatures of molecular reorientation and multipolar Raman scattering, both of which may be driven by local optical field gradients that are operative in TERS. We illustrate these concepts and introduce the readers to the generally less appreciated and equally exciting world of TERS on the left-hand side of the Schrödinger equation.

Multimodal Tip-Enhanced Nonlinear Optical Nanoimaging of Plasmonic Silver Nanocubes

Optical field localization at plasmonic tip-sample nanojunctions has enabled high-spatial-resolution chemical analysis through tip-enhanced linear optical spectroscopies, including Raman scattering and photoluminescence. Here, we illustrate that nonlinear optical processes, including parametric four-wave mixing (4WM), second-harmonic/sum-frequency generation (SHG and SFG), and two-photon photoluminescence (TPPL), can be enhanced at plasmonic junctions and spatiospectrally resolved simultaneously with few-nm spatial resolution under ambient conditions. Through a detailed analysis of our spectral nanoimages, we find that the efficiencies of the local nonlinear signals are determined by sharp tip-sample junction resonances that vary over the few-nanometer length scale. Namely, plasmon resonances centered at or around the different nonlinear signals are tracked through TPPL, and they are found to selectively enhance nonlinear signals with closely matched optical resonances.