Researchers at Rice University believe that “microscopic channels of gold nanoparticles have the ability to transmit electromagnetic energy that starts as light and propagates via ‘dark plasmons.’” Plasmons are “waves of electrons that move across the surface of a metal, like water in a pond, when disturbed.”
Head researcher, Stephan Link, has “developed a way to ‘print’ fine lines of gold nanoparticles on glass” which can transmit signals from one nanoparticles to the next.
Link’s researchers “used an electron beam to cut tiny channels into a polymer on a glass substrate to give the nanoparticle lines their shape. The gold nanoparticles were deposited into the channels via capillary forces. When the rest of the polymer and stray nanoparticles were washed away, the lines remained, with the particles only a few nanometers apart.”
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