TY - JOUR A1 - Esmann, M. A1 - Chimeh, A. A1 - Korte, A. A1 - Zhong, J. A1 - Stephan, S. A1 - Witt, Julia A1 - Wittstock, G. A1 - Talebi, N. A1 - Lienau, C. T1 - Plasmonic nanofocusing spectral interferometry N2 - We describe and demonstrate a novel experimental approach to measure broadband, amplitude- and phase-resolved scattering spectra of single nanoparticles with 10-nm spatial resolution. Nanofocusing of Surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) propagating along the shaft of a conical gold taper is used to create a spatially isolated, spectrally broad nanoscale light source at ist very apex. The interference between these incident SPPs and SPPs that are backpropagating from the apex leads to the formation of an inherently phase-stable interferogram, which we detect in the far field by partially scattering SPPs off a small protrusion on the taper shaft. We show that these interferograms allow the reconstruction of both the amplitude and phase of the local optical near fields around individual nanoparticles optically coupled to the taper apex. We extract local light scattering spectra of particles and quantify line broadenings and spectral shifts induced by tip-sample coupling. Our experimental findings are supported by corresponding finite-difference time-domain and coupled dipole simulations and Show that, in the limit of weak tip-sample coupling, the measurements directly probe the projected local density of optical states of the plasmonic system. The combination of a highly stable inline interferometer with the inherent optical background suppression through nanofocusing makes it a promising tool for the locally resolved study of the spectral and temporal optical response of coupled hybrid nanosystems. KW - Plasmonic nanofocusing KW - Near-field spectroscopy PY - 2020 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-504985 VL - 9 IS - 2 SP - 491 EP - 508 PB - De Gruyter AN - OPUS4-50498 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Essmann, M. A1 - Becker, S. F. A1 - Witt, Julia A1 - Zhan, J. A1 - Chimeh, A. A1 - Korte, A. A1 - Zhong, J. A1 - Vogelgesang, R. A1 - Wittstock, G. A1 - Lienau, C. T1 - Vectorial near-field coupling N2 - The coherent exchange of optical near fields between two neighbouring dipoles plays an essential role in the optical properties, quantum dynamics and thus the function of many naturally occurring and artificial nanosystems. These interactions are challenging to quantify experimentally. They extend over only a few nanometres and depend sensitively on the detuning, dephasing and relative orientation (that is, the vectorial properties) of the coupled dipoles. Here, we introduce plasmonic nanofocusing spectroscopy to record coherent light scattering spectra with 5 nm spatial resolution from the apex of a conical gold nanotaper. The apex is excited solely by evanescent fields and coupled to plasmon resonances in a single gold nanorod. We resolve resonance energy shifts and line broadenings as a function of dipole distance and relative orientation. We demonstrate how These phenomena arise from mode couplings between different vectorial components of the interacting optical near fields, specifically from the coupling of the nanorod to both transverse and longitudinal polarizabilities of the taper apex. KW - Plasmon resonance KW - Coherent exchange KW - Optical near field KW - Plasmonic nanofocusing spectroscopy PY - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-019-0441-y SN - 1748-3387 VL - 14 IS - 7 SP - 698 EP - 704 PB - Nature AN - OPUS4-48028 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -